# North American telephone area codes
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [November 27, 2020, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588 "2020-11-27T13:32:35Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 3
### Author:  [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)
#### Post date: [December 9, 2020, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/41 "2020-12-09T22:36:02Z")
Thirty or forty years from now, the Dopers of the future will be reminisicing about how when they were kids, you only needed to enter 7 digits, not 10 digits, for local calls.
Course by then, all communications will be by implanted cerebral chips.
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### Author:  [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)
#### Post date: [December 9, 2020, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/42 "2020-12-09T23:02:44Z")
> [@Keeve](#):
>
> I grew up in the 1960s, and everyone in the (North Jersey) neighborhood began with either KL1, KL2 or KL5.
In Paducah, KY they still had mechanical switching into the mid-1970s. I distinctly remember being able to dial just the last five numbers for a local call, because every phone in the city started with either 442- 443- or 444-
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### Author:  [@Keeve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Keeve)
#### Post date: [December 10, 2020, 1:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/43 "2020-12-10T01:03:32Z")
> [@hajario](#):
>
> KL5 would have been 555 which I don’t think was ever allowed.
True. And that’s why it appears so often on TV and in movies. [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Klondike\_5](https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Klondike_5)
I used “KL” as a substitute, to anonymize the town where I grew up.
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### Author:  [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)
#### Post date: [December 10, 2020, 7:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/44 "2020-12-10T07:39:49Z")
In the future? Right now, only two out of 35 area codes in Canada even still allow seven-digit dialing!
(Exercise for the reader: which two? 🙂 )
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### Author:  [@Zakalwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zakalwe)
#### Post date: [December 10, 2020, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/45 "2020-12-10T12:44:49Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#):
>
> Thirty or forty years from now, the Dopers of the future will be reminisicing about how when they were kids, you only needed to enter 7 digits, not 10 digits, for local calls.
We switch in February 2021. We’re getting a new “overlay” area code. I think you should have said “three or four years from now”. 🙂
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### Author:  [@Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulf_the_Unwashed)
#### Post date: [December 10, 2020, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/46 "2020-12-10T20:54:50Z")
I’m in the US, still have seven digit dialing. No talk that I know of of making it ten.
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### Author:  [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)
#### Post date: [December 10, 2020, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/47 "2020-12-10T21:12:32Z")
At my high school in rural North Texas in the 1980s; probably 90+% of the students had the same leading 6 digits. There was one exchange in town, so only the kids on the fringes of the district (whose homes were technically in the next town’s exchange) had anything different.
I note that town now has FOUR exchanges, belonging to three different companies, but of course back in the 1980s there was only one phone company.
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### Author:  [@Mr\_Downtown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Downtown)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2020, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/48 "2020-12-11T05:05:31Z")
Yes, numbers shifted from EXChange + 4 digits to EXchange + 5 digits in the late 1940s. Of course, that was really only in big cities. Smaller cities typically didn’t dial the exchange—because they only had one. If you needed to reach a different exchange (meaning a different town), you asked the operator to arrange that.
I’m also very curious whether your New Jersey exchange was _really_ KLondike 5. I’ve never heard of that except as a backformation to make fake 555- numbers more palatable or less anachronistic.
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### Author:  [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2020, 5:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/49 "2020-12-11T05:43:08Z")
> [@Kent\_Clark](#):
>
> In Paducah, KY they still had mechanical switching into the mid-1970s. I distinctly remember being able to dial just the last five numbers for a local call, because every phone in the city started with either 442- 443- or 444-
When I was attending the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the 1980s, the entire campus (including all of the phones in the residence halls) were on the 66x exchange, and were all apparently in one local network. You could call any other number on campus by simply dialing the final five digits of the phone number.
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### Author:  [@Lord\_Feldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Feldon)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2020, 6:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/50 "2020-12-11T06:16:33Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#):
>
> You could call any other number on campus by simply dialing the final five digits of the phone number.
The Ohio State campus in Columbus still had this as of 2010. It was awkward by then, because cell phones were ubiquitous but there were still numbers that were primarily listed using the 5 digits that you could only call from a campus phone.
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### Author:  [@Keeve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Keeve)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2020, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/51 "2020-12-11T13:25:34Z")
> [@Mr\_Downtown](#):
>
> I’m also very curious whether your New Jersey exchange was _really_ KLondike 5.
No, it was not, as I wrote about 8 posts ago.
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### Author:  [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2020, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/52 "2020-12-11T17:48:45Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#):
>
> When I was attending the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the 1980s, the entire campus (including all of the phones in the residence halls) were on the 66x exchange, and were all apparently in one local network. You could call any other number on campus by simply dialing the final five digits of the phone number.
That dialing system was most likely an AT&T product called **[Centrex](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centrex)**. Which was very common on college and business campuses, military bases, etc. The big advantage to the school or business was that the local telephone company handled all the infrastructure; you didn’t need to buy & maintain your own on-campus switching equipment.
> [@Lord\_Feldon](#):
>
> The Ohio State campus in Columbus still had this as of 2010. It was awkward by then, because cell phones were ubiquitous but there were still numbers that were primarily listed using the 5 digits that you could only call from a campus phone.
But once you knew what the correct leading 5 digits were, they _should_ have been the same for every one of those on-campus phones. IOW, once you know to dial e.g. “614-31” ahead of whatever 5-digit campus number, that _should_ work from any cellphone or off-campus landline.
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### Author:  [@Mark\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mark_Finn)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2020, 12:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/53 "2020-12-12T12:30:36Z")
My university had the same thing - all numbers began with “area code+3 digits”, so there were four unique numbers for each phone line, and internally, you could call any university number by dialling the last four digits.
Of course - there were numbers you couldn’t use: those beginning with “9” (since “9” signified an outside call); “0” (an operator would answer); and numbers starting with combinations such as “411” or “911”.
I think eventually they added another exchange and required 5-digit internal dialling.
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### Author:  [@mundylion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mundylion)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2020, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/54 "2020-12-12T16:46:36Z")
Growing up in the late 40’s, my first memory of any phone number at all was on the truck door of my classmate’s father’s truck. He had an electric business. His phone number was proudly displayed “7”.
I’m sure a caller had to give the switchboard operator the number.
The first time I got up the nerve to try using that big thing on the wall, I cranked it and a lady said “Central”. I expected “Operator” I think so I smoothly just stood mute long enough for her to hang up.
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### Author:  [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)
#### Post date: [December 13, 2020, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/55 "2020-12-13T05:05:40Z")
> [@Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](#):
>
> I’m in the US, still have seven digit dialing. No talk that I know of of making it ten.
Since my parents’ rural county was assigned a new area code in the late 1990s, they’ve had to dial eleven digits (1-555-555-5555) even just to call across the street. It sucks. We still have seven-digit dialing where I live.
> [@Mark\_Finn](#):
>
> My university had the same thing - all numbers began with “area code+3 digits”, so there were four unique numbers for each phone line, and internally, you could call any university number by dialling the last four digits…
The municipal government of the rather large city in which I live has that. Very convenient. I can call city hall, the police department, parks and rec, coworkers in my court, etc. just by picking up the phone and dialing four digits.
This thread may be of interest, too: [When will all the area codes run out?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-will-all-the-area-codes-run-out/417797)
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### Author:  [@Folacin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Folacin)
#### Post date: [December 16, 2020, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/56 "2020-12-16T20:17:39Z")
> [@mundylion](#):
>
> His phone number was proudly displayed “7”.
>
> I’m sure a caller had to give the switchboard operator the number.
My Dad’s law office number was 224 until 1973 or so when we got dial phones. I remember him calling back home when we were on vacation in Seattle. There was some confusion as he had to get the operator to connect him to the town operator (direct dial being obviously right out). I’m certain that the phone company had procedures for that (they had procedures for everything), but equally certain that the odds of any random big city operator having actually performed that procedure were astronomical.
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### Author:  [@Keeve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Keeve)
#### Post date: [December 16, 2020, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/57 "2020-12-16T20:54:22Z")
> [@Folacin](#):
>
> My Dad’s law office number was 224 until 1973 or so when we got dial phones.
Is there a typo here? I hope I’m not being offensive if I ask which area got dial phones in 1973, and how your phones worked before that.
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### Author:  [@Folacin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Folacin)
#### Post date: [December 16, 2020, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/58 "2020-12-16T21:09:03Z")
No typo. We had a town operator (just like Sarah on The Andy Griffith Show). The operator’s switchboard was upstairs in the bank (and next to my dad’s original office).
You picked up the handset, and told the operator the number you wanted. If you didn’t know the number, you could ask for a person and if she wasn’t busy and in a good mood she’d connect you anyway.
The farmers were generally on party lines, and had numbers like 13r7l2 (where I think the r7l2 represented long and short rings for a particular home (but don’t hold me to that)). We were a bit unusual in that we lived in town but had a party line (Dad’s office and our home). The home number was 224c2, and calls for the residence had two shorter rings.
Oh, and south central MN. We had a local phone company named after the county - I assume all the towns had operators and they gradually upgraded their equipment to replace them around the same time.
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### Author:  [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)
#### Post date: [December 16, 2020, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/59 "2020-12-16T21:32:58Z")
> [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](#):
>
> 🤨 And what time period are you talking about? Because I grew up in the 1980s and only the area code would be the same. I didn’t know a single other person with the same first three digits and I don’t remember anyone else’s numbers being the same as other people’s either.
I’m a lot older than you – exchanges were letters not numbers — and even back in those prehistoric times, most people I knew had different exchanges. Of course, I grew up in Los Angeles.
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### Author:  [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)
#### Post date: [December 16, 2020, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/north-american-telephone-area-codes/926588/60 "2020-12-16T21:39:04Z")
ETA: we’re in an overlay area and have had to dial the entire phone number with the 1 prefix for every call for a looooooooong time. Shortly after the 310 area code was created???
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