# Before the telephone, how did you get someone's attention if you needed them quickly? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 21, 2025, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945 "2025-06-21T18:42:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![HeyHomie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/heyhomie/32/207_2.png) [@HeyHomie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HeyHomie)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/1 "2025-06-21T18:42:05Z")
Let’s say it’s London, 1850, and I need to speak to Mr. Farthingsteadshaw forthwith. If I’ve learned anything from TV and movies, it behooves me to “send for” him. But what does that mean? Do I just find a street urchin, hope he knows his way around London well enough to find my quarry’s address, and tip him a shilling? Were there companies that offered this as a service? ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/2 "2025-06-21T18:49:59Z")
I would recommend posting a letter and hoping that the postmaster was familiar with the recipient. You might also post a classified ad in one of the newspapers addressed to the person. ---
**Author:** ![Kropotkin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kropotkin/32/18045_2.png) [@Kropotkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kropotkin)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/3 "2025-06-21T18:50:02Z")
One so directs one’s servant, who then does whatever it may require to fulfill this duty, upon pain of immediate firing and disgrace. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/4 "2025-06-21T18:54:56Z")
There were several post deliveries _per day_ in Victorian London. There was also the telegram option, which could be sent within London and would be delivered immediately by a telegram boy. (Based on my extensive reading of Holmes. In one, Watson even comments that Holmes would send telegrams when it was quicker just to walk to the individual’s residence.) ---
**Author:** ![pjd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pjd/32/3009_2.png) [@pjd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pjd)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/5 "2025-06-21T18:55:37Z")
In those days, mail was collected/delivered up to 12 times a day, so sending him a letter would be fairly quick. eta. ninjad. bloody typical. ---
**Author:** ![Schnitte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/schnitte/32/9033_2.png) [@Schnitte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schnitte)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/6 "2025-06-21T18:57:32Z")
By 1850, a city like London would be covered by a directory. Those were printed books, compiled and marketed commercially, with the postal addresses of upper-class and otherwise notable residents. To this day, they’re a valuable source for genealogists. ---
**Author:** ![md-2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9d8465/32.png) [@md-2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md-2000)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/7 "2025-06-21T18:57:53Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > (Based on my extensive reading of Holmes. In one, Watson even comments that Holmes would send telegrams when it was quicker just to walk to the individual’s residence.) I assume then the telegraph office was closer. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/8 "2025-06-21T19:03:02Z")
> [@pjd](#): > > In those days, mail was collected/delivered up to 12 times a day, so sending > him a letter would be fairly quick. Thank you for confirming my long-ago memory! Remember, London was the commercial capital of the Empire. Businesses always want the quickest possible communication, so multiple post deliveries per day was the cutting edge of communications technology. That government service was very valuable to the commercial world. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/9 "2025-06-21T19:06:35Z")
Were there couriers back then (bike messengers are probably the common version today) if you wanted something to go even faster? E.G. Hand the letter to some person whose sole goal was to arrow as fast as possible to the recipient? I’d think the government and well off would want that. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/10 "2025-06-21T19:06:56Z")
> [@Kropotkin](#): > > One so directs one’s servant, who then does whatever it may require to fulfill this duty Inclusive of murder? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/11 "2025-06-21T19:07:45Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Were there couriers back then if you wanted something to go even faster? Sounds likely, but no idea. ---
**Author:** ![Kropotkin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kropotkin/32/18045_2.png) [@Kropotkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kropotkin)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/12 "2025-06-21T19:38:04Z")
One doesn’t interfere with how the help performs their tasks. ---
**Author:** ![Folly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/folly/32/3219_2.png) [@Folly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Folly)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/13 "2025-06-21T19:44:06Z")
Holmes had a page named Billy. Mentioned in a few stories at least. ETA. Well, I looked it up. Billy wasn’t in the original series. Just plays and movies. He embodied some of the characteristics of the Baker Street Irregulars. ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/14 "2025-06-21T20:03:30Z")
> **[A Short Statistical Sketch of the Child Labour Market in Mid-Ninete...](https://journals.openedition.org/rfcb/1606)** > > The distinctiveness of the nineteenth-century London labour market has long been adverted to by scholars of economic and social history. However, the importance of London to British economic develo... "Mayhew, in his discussion of errand runners, actually provided an underestimate of their number, suggesting that England and Wales as a whole contained a total of 24,205 male porters, messengers and errand boys and that about a fifth _‘were lads under 20 years of age.’_ In fact, the 1851 census disclosed a total of 88,950 of which 59 per cent were aged below 20. I suspect all you had to do was open a window and yell, “Hey boy!” ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/15 "2025-06-21T20:23:45Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > There were several post deliveries _per day_ in Victorian London. There was also the telegram option, which could be sent within London and would be delivered immediately by a telegram boy. Correct- mail was very fast, a telegraph was even faster and there were messenger services. > [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Were there couriers back then (bike messengers are probably the common version today) if you wanted something to go even faster? Yes. In fact if you were well off you’d have many servants, and one of them would have the job of delivering messages, or at least trotting one over to a messenger service or the Post or the telegraph office. Likely if the message was important, you’d have a better job of getting someone’s attention than you would now. (I know people who dont answer their telephone). ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/16 "2025-06-21T20:25:44Z")
> [@Folly](#): > > ETA. Well, I looked it up. Billy wasn’t in the original series. Just plays and movies. He embodied some of the characteristics of the Baker Street Irregulars. To be precise, Billy appeared in _[The Adventure of the Mazarin Stone](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Adventure_of_the_Mazarin_Stone)._ Although that is unusual, as Doyle originally wrote it as a one-act play before adapting it in text. He’s part of the canon, though. ---
**Author:** ![Banksiaman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banksiaman/32/3334_2.png) [@Banksiaman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banksiaman)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/17 "2025-06-21T20:40:10Z")
If you were a person of consequence you had servants, and one of them, possibly the boy who ran messages and did odd-jobs, would be ushered off with a note. If you wanted to signal that this was urgent and important, you would send a senior (male) servant. You could dismiss a runner / boy / lackey, but someone at butler level was as good as the man himself standing in the doorway. ---
**Author:** ![HeyHomie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/heyhomie/32/207_2.png) [@HeyHomie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HeyHomie)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/18 "2025-06-21T22:44:56Z")
Huh. Ignorance fought. I wonder if that would have been the case in, say, New York or Boston in those days. I’m reminded of the old saying: in America, the Post Office delivers the mail, and in the UK, the Royal Mail delivers the post. ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/19 "2025-06-21T23:14:47Z")
Although “the city” (offices) had multiple post deliveries, I’ve never read anything suggesting that the “suburbs” (for example, the real address of the fictional Sherlock) had anything other than daily deliveries (although collections from the “post boxes” would be more frequent.) You might wonder what the point of collecting from the post boxes would be, but remember that it was all collected and sorted by hand, plus of course the city delivery would be 3 or 4 times a day. By the way, in Paris, if you were sending a note to a home in the inner suburbs, you would send a “small blue” – a _petit bleu_, a card sent by the pneumatic post system and delivered by a postal boy. It was a torn-up bleu that eventually implicated Esterhazy in the Dreyfus affair. There was eventually around 300 miles of pneumatic tube, and it avoided the process of encoding/decoding for telegraph transmission. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945/20 "2025-06-21T23:37:27Z")
When i was a child, in a random US suburb, the mail was collected 3-4 times each day from mail boxes. It was printed on each box when mail would be picked up. And the mail boat came twice daily to the island where i vacationed. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-the-telephone-how-did-you-get-someones-attention-if-you-needed-them-quickly/1019945.md?page=2)