Dating an Old Phone Number
de...@petinfo4u.com
Hi!
I am hoping you can help ... I have an old picture that has a "antique"
phone number. I am trying to date the picture. Below is the phone
number located in Brooklyn New York:
TRiangle 5-7871
Can you date this phone number? I have searched the internet with no =
luck.
Any help is appreciated,
Debra
Joseph
> I am hoping you can help ... I have an old picture that has a "antique"
> phone number. I am trying to date the picture. Below is the phone
> number located in Brooklyn New York:
> TRiangle 5-7871
> Can you date this phone number? I have searched the internet with no =
> luck.
Unless you have access to a history of when central office exchanges
were put into service it's unlikely that you'll find this information.
When I was in high school in 1970 I got hold of a publication from New
England Telephone (hand typed!) that gave a history in the state of
when the many and various COs were installed with magneto, common
battery and dial offices. The book gave the dates when the various
towns' service changed from one thing to another. Unless you can get
hold of that information from someone who has connections to
Verizon/Bell Atlantic/New York Telephone you may not be able to get
the information. It's sad but the present "owners" of plant don't
appear to be very concerned about their past and not a lot of effort
has been put into documenting that past.
sin nombre
> Hi!
> I am hoping you can help ... I have an old picture that has a "antique"
> phone number. I am trying to date the picture. Below is the phone
> number located in Brooklyn New York:
> TRiangle 5-7871
> Can you date this phone number? I have searched the internet with no =
> luck.
> Any help is appreciated,
> Debra
http://www.nyhistory.org/library/nyhsqa.html#tele
When were New York City telephone exchanges switched from a combination of
letters and numbers to all numbers?
The first all-number telephone exchange was assigned in 1960, to the
offices of Western Electric, as part of the New York Telephone
Company's long-range plan to avert an anticipated shortage of phone
numbers.
And a long-range plan it was: not until 1978 were lettered exchanges
eliminated from the white pages directory, followed by the switch to
all-number exchanges in the yellow pages directory in February, 1979.
Still, many New Yorkers, for reasons of status, habit or sentiment,
continued to state their numbers with the obsolete prefixes of PLaza 5,
REgent-7 or TRafalgar-3 well into the 1980s.
Sources:
"All-Number Numbers for Phone Begun Here." New York Times, 6 December 1960.
Ferretti, Fred. "PHone EXchanges LOse THeir LEtters." The New York Times,
24 July 1978.
Lisa Hancock
> I am hoping you can help ... I have an old picture that has a "antique"
> phone number. I am trying to date the picture. Below is the phone
> number located in Brooklyn New York: TRiangle 5-7871
> Can you date this phone number? I have searched the internet with no =
> luck.
Unfortunately, there is not enough information. I don't know when
that particular exchange went into service in NYC, but the picture
could easily date from the 1930s until whenever the old telephone set
shown was replaced by a modern set.
If we knew the model of the telephone set we might be able to define a
start date (that is, if it is a modern 500 set (basically the same
kind used today except with Touch Tone) we would know the picture was
after 1950s. But if it was an older sets we'd have to guess because
older sets remained in service for many years.
Arthur Kamlet
<JoeOfS...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> On Sun, 15 Aug 2004 14:31:29 -0700, <de...@petinfo4u.com> wrote:
>> I am hoping you can help ... I have an old picture that has a "antique"
>> phone number. I am trying to date the picture. Below is the phone
>> number located in Brooklyn New York:
>> TRiangle 5-7871
>> Can you date this phone number? I have searched the internet with no =
>> luck.
My best guess is East New York around late 40s early 50s.
Art Kamlet ArtKamlet @ AOL.com Columbus OH K2PZH