# old telephone number format **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 14, 2004, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279 "2004-03-14T20:50:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![UDS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecae2f/32.png) [@UDS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UDS)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/21 "2004-03-15T01:33:30Z")
> [@Sunspace](#): > > There’s a George Gamester [column](http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1079219409756&call_pageid=970599109774&col=Columnist969907616933) in today’s Toronto Star about a 82-year-old local farmer named Tom Jackson. It mentions his boyhood home on 12th Street in what was then the outlying town of New Toronto, where the phone number was **4**. Yes, 4. 🙂 Apparently there were only a dozen or so phones in town. From his age, this would be the early 1920s. > > I wonder who had the first three phones? Well, if the Irish practice is anything to go by, “1” would be the post office (and telephone exchange), “2” would be the police, and “3” would be the first private household to get a telephone - often the doctor. ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/22 "2004-03-15T01:50:31Z")
The article _did_ mention that Mr Jackson’s father was the mayor. I was thinking the first three would be the phone company, the police, and the firehall… ---
**Author:** ![spingears](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ebca7d/32.png) [@spingears](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/spingears)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/23 "2004-03-15T01:58:24Z")
I can remeber when we had a phone installed in a small town in south east Iowa. It was the type seen in old time movies. Hung on the wall, big ear piece hung on the left, carbon granule microphone on up/down adjustable arm and a crank on the right to get the operator’s attention in the central office downtown. Just turn the crank, and wait for the operator to connect to your line. Tell her who you wanted to talk to or give her the number. she would then connect the second cord to the correct jack and ring the other party with one, two, or three rings depending on wherhter the callled party had a private line or it was on a two or three party line. The exchange was designated by the name of the town. Later when we lived in and near Chicago the exchanges had two letter designations and matching names to ease the operatorers connectring duties. It was the late fifties or later when the system (AT&T) came up with area codes, and still later that touch tone dialing came into being. Continued growth of the system required redistricting area codes, and today the need for more numbers and exchanges continues to expand. 4 digit exchanges anyone? ---
**Author:** ![MisterThyristor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ecccb3/32.png) [@MisterThyristor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MisterThyristor)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/24 "2004-03-15T02:30:08Z")
Well, the song “PEnnsylvania 6-5000” was recorded by Glenn Miller before 1940, so the 7-digit number goes back at least that far. Here in Cleveland, one of the local advertisers still uses their exchange name and number – “GArfield 1-2323”. I still remember my old exchange was WHitney, so I guess that makes me officially an old fogey, huh? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Mercury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e95f7d/32.png) [@Mercury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mercury)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/25 "2004-03-15T02:42:23Z")
I moved out of New Rochelle (near Scarsdale), NY in 2000. The city has a few different exchanges, but ours was 636. I occasionally heard it as NEw-Rochelle-6. ---
**Author:** ![ccwaterback](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/df705f/32.png) [@ccwaterback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ccwaterback)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/26 "2004-03-15T03:16:59Z")
The first time I used a phone in Germany I thought the ring tone was a busy signal and the busy signal was a ring tone. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![blasphmer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6de8d8/32.png) [@blasphmer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blasphmer)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/27 "2004-03-15T03:22:45Z")
Samples Sales is still using BR-549 in their ads. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/28 "2004-03-15T03:29:36Z")
I have a NY City Map from 1934 where the scheme involves 7 digits, so the change there must have taken place earlier. One way the phone company is adding numbers is by changing the standards for area codes and exchanges. Area codes used to have a 1 or 0 as the middle digits, now they can have any three digits. At the same time, the exchanges can include a 1 or 0, making more phone numbers available. ---
**Author:** ![Sigene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df788c/32.png) [@Sigene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sigene)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/29 "2004-03-15T03:29:38Z")
My Dad’s phone number (rural Missouri 1930’s) was “two longs and a short.” The whole damn system was a party line. If you wanted to call his house, the operator rang the phones (yes, all of them) with two long rings and one short ring. Other people had different numbers (like three longs; a long and two shorts, etc) ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 3:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/30 "2004-03-15T03:38:23Z")
When I was a teen in the Antelope Valley (the northern edge of L.A. County, up in the high desert) I remember seeing old ads that used “WHitehall-8-1234”. Although no one ever said “WHitehall”, all of the phone numbers in Lancaster and Quartz Hill started with “94”. This enables something interesting: You only had to dial five numbers within Lancaster and Quartz Hill. When asked for a phone number, people would only give you five digits. It made it very easy to remember numbers. But there was a problem with the system. Palmdale was just seven miles south of Lancaster, and yet it was a long-diastance call. You had to dial **1** -947-xxxx. Another complicating factor was that some Palmdale numbers were 273. This would make dialing my old number, 3-5583, problematic if the system were more closely integrated. Finally (I think in the early-1980s) the phone system was upgraded so that Palmdale was no longer long-distance. But five-digit dialing slowly went away. For a couple of years we could dial 3-5583 or 8-6753 or whatever; but by the time I moved away, five-digit dialing was completely gone. ---
**Author:** ![Jman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jman/32/4416_2.png) [@Jman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jman)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/31 "2004-03-15T05:10:56Z")
> [@MisterThyristor](#): > > Here in Cleveland, one of the local advertisers still uses their exchange name and number – “GArfield 1-2323”. Holy cow…that’s a lightbulb going on years too late. I grew up in NE Ohio, and can still hear the annoying way they say Garfield 1-2323, but I never knew they were using this exchange code. If I had ever had a need to call that number, I probably would have dialed the whole name. I can remember being confused by hearing that, and thinking…“that’s the wrong number of numbers!” :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 7:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/32 "2004-03-15T07:29:17Z")
**Numbering eras in the United States for the Bell System:** • First telephone exchanges use just the names of subscribers (1878). • Depending on exchange size, two, three or four digit numbers assigned to subscribers (1879). • Two-letter prefix codes assigned to four-digit numbers (circa 1928 to 1958). • In larger cities, two-letter prefix codes assigned to five-digit numbers (circa WWII). • First area codes introduced (1951). • Seven-digit, all-number dialing begins phase-in (1958). • Touch Tone dialing introduced to consumers (1962). • Nearly all of North American telephone network converted to all-number dialing (1985?). • Last party lines, with single digits like Rodeo Creek Number 8, closed in the 1990s. ---
**Author:** ![gutterhippo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/6bbea6/32.png) [@gutterhippo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gutterhippo)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/33 "2004-03-15T07:32:53Z")
wait… so if the system of putting a word at the beginning of the number was done to signify the numbers, then how did they know which numbers corresponded to which letters? I remember we had an old rotary phone at it didn’t have the lettering system. Did other phones have lettering? And as a followup question: when did they start assigning letters to numbers? And, how did they decide that 7 and 9 should have 4 letters associated with them instead of 3? ---
**Author:** ![Kegg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Kegg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kegg)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 8:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/34 "2004-03-15T08:46:27Z")
In Oakland, Ca. the old system (name and No.'s) was changed in 1970, and I remember thinking that I would never be able to remember and ones phone no. I do tho, and now I think TEmple-bar 2-0610 is odd, * * * Spelling and grammer subject to change with out notice. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 9:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/35 "2004-03-15T09:02:40Z")
> [@gutterhippo](#): > > wait… so if the system of putting a word at the beginning of the number was done to signify the numbers, then how did they know which numbers corresponded to which letters? The named exchanges were added in the 1920s, when most telephones did not have dials. You picked up the handset, an operator answered, you told the operator the number you wanted (e.g., “Richmond 8460”), and the operator connected you. > [@](#): > > I remember we had an old rotary phone at it didn’t have the lettering system. Did other phones have lettering? Your telephone must have been an anomaly. > [@](#): > > And as a followup question: when did they start assigning letters to numbers? AT&T’s operating companies started installing dial telephones, with letters assigned to the numbers on the dial, in the mid to late 1920s. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 9:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/36 "2004-03-15T09:09:11Z")
Slight correction: the Bell System (AT&T) installed its first dial system in Omaha, Nebraska in 1921. Before then, some independent telephone companies had begun replacing operator switchboards with machine switching systems that worked with dial telephones. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 9:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/37 "2004-03-15T09:23:48Z")
A well-written [Atlanta Telephone History](http://home.speedfactory.net/cardwell/part2.html#1920) covers all the major changes in telephone dialing and switching over the years. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/38 "2004-03-15T14:58:35Z")
> [@](#): > > I remember we had an old rotary phone at it didn’t have the lettering system. Did other phones have lettering? I have a rotary telephone. I liked to use it when I was in L.A., but I haven’t gotten around to plugging it in yet here in the house. Anyway, it has letters associated with the numbers. > [@](#): > > And, how did they decide that 7 and 9 should have 4 letters associated with them instead of 3? My cell phone and the cordless phone have “Q” on 7 and “Z” on 9. The rotary phone and corded touchtone phone do not. “Q” and “Z” are relatively recent additions. My guess is that they added “Z” to the 9 button and “Q” to the 7 button because those are logical places for them. (The 7 key has “PRS”, so “Q” would have to go there; and the 9 key has “WXY”, so it’s logical to put the “Z” there.) Why were they omitted in the first place? My guess is that they only had 24 spaces available (having decided that the 1 and 0 keys would not have letters associated with them) and Q and Z were chozen to be dropped because they were not used as often as other letters. ---
**Author:** ![plnnr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7ea924/32.png) [@plnnr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/plnnr)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/39 "2004-03-15T15:10:28Z")
Growing up our number was OLdfield 9-4574 (actually, my parents still have the same telephone number). We also had a bakelite rotary telephone up into the 1980s. When it finally died we tried to get it fixed and the the telephone company said “Fixed? They don’t even make them anymore, and besides, it isn’t your telephone to get fixed.” Originally, the telephone belonged to the telephone company. I’d love to have it just for a conversation piece (the thing weighed a ton). My former father-in-law,who is in his late 70s, still asks “What’s Lee’s ring?” when he needs to know a telephone number. ---
**Author:** ![Mehitabel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8797f3/32.png) [@Mehitabel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mehitabel)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2004, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279/40 "2004-03-15T15:31:13Z")
Heh. My grandparents had me memorize their numbers in the late 60’s–FAirfield4-4516 (the Bronx) and APplegate7-4759 (Brooklyn). But when I learned to read in the early 70’s, most people were using the seven numbers. Like the 212 area code in Manhattan, some exchanges were considered more classy than others. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-telephone-number-format/234279.md?page=3)