http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=105x8749762Hmmmm.
raccoon (1000+ posts) Wed May-06-09 11:22 AM
Original message
What did it mean when people in some places in long ago times had phone numbers that started with a name? Like, "Pennsylvania 5-6000" or whatever?
I'm chronologically gifted, and I never in RL heard a number like that, only in TV or movies.
"Chronologically gifted."
Oh my.
Rosie1223 (753 posts) Wed May-06-09 11:28 AM
Response to Original message
1. The word was like an area code, I think
Numbers were like that in the 1950s -- you dialed the first 2 letters of the word, then the rest of the numbers.
raccoon (1000+ posts) Wed May-06-09 11:30 AM
Response to Reply #1
2. Well thanks. I was around in the 50's but that must've been something they didn't do in my area.
Oh Hell, that solves it.
The primitive isn't "chronologically gifted," but just simply plain old.
Rosie1223 (753 posts) Wed May-06-09 11:35 AM
Response to Reply #2
5. I'm not old enough to remember it either
But I do remember at my grandmother's house when you only needed to dial 5 digits to get someone else in the same small town.
Now, franksolich could remember that; that was still being done in small towns as late as the early 1980s.
LeftyFingerPop (1000+ posts) Wed May-06-09 11:39 AM
Response to Reply #5
7. Yes, for some exchanges, it worked like this...
If the phone number was, say 657-2122, you could just dial the last 5 digits...72122.
Yeppers, no ancient history there.
LeftyFingerPop (1000+ posts) Wed May-06-09 11:33 AM
Response to Original message
3. The word represented the first 2 digits of the phone number...
Pennsylvania 5-6000 = PE5-6000. Looking at the dial pad, PE is 73, so the phone number is 735-6000.
Edit correction: "PE", not "PA".
Arkansas Granny (1000+ posts) Wed May-06-09 11:53 AM
Response to Reply #3
11. That's right. Our prefix was Mayfair which changed to 62X-XXXX.
You can sometimes hear people in old movies asking the operator for phone numbers using a name as a prefix to the number.
Aristus (1000+ posts) Wed May-06-09 11:38 AM
Response to Original message
6. That was back when there were far fewer people with telephones.
The name usually came from the area of the local telephone exchange and transfer station (for land lines. They disappeared with the advent of fiber-optics.) In this case, a station on Pennsylvania Avenue, or Street, or whatever. The first two numbers corresponded to the first two letters in the name, which you could dial. That's why telephones had letters to go with the numbers. (Now they're used for texting. Who knew? What foresight!) And the name made it easier to remember the number prefix.
I think it would have been cool to pick up the phone and say: "Operator, get me MAdison-5-5379, quick!" like some detective in an old movie. Modern technology is wonderful, but sometimes has less character than the old stuff.
Gidney N Cloyd (1000+ posts) Wed May-06-09 11:40 AM
Response to Original message
8. 8 digit phone numbers were so hard to remember back then that they >>>>>> thought converting the first to numbers to represent a word would help. Like in the area I grew up in, 832-1234 became TErrace-2-1234.
Arugula Latte (1000+ posts) Wed May-06-09 11:44 AM
Response to Original message
9. Operator, give me Butterfield 8 ...
I always thought that was so cool when people asked for those types of numbers in old timey movies. I wish we could revive that custom.
Typical primitive, wanting to live in the past.
bikebloke (1000+ posts) Wed May-06-09 11:57 AM
Response to Original message
13. Still used here.
In DC area, the number for the weather forecast is still WE6-1212, WE for WEather. It's been that number all my life.
Blue Diadem (1000+ posts) Wed May-06-09 12:09 PM
Response to Original message
14. It was just a few years ago that we began having to dial the full numbers here.
We were able to call anyone with our same first 3 numbers by dialing the 3rd of those numbers and the last four, as in x-xxxx. It changed when we had to dial the area codes for all numbers. While that doesn't have anything to do with your question, I remember thinking it was strange when we moved here, difficult to get used to and difficult to change once we developed the habit.
Our prefix was Oxford when I was a kid.
I vaguely recall our prefix--about two decades later than the time this primitive's referring to--as SUNSET in the Platte River town where I spent my childhood, and TROJAN in the Sandhills town where I spent my adolescence. But not being a user of telephones, I had no idea the significance of any of it.
Inchworm (1000+ posts) Wed May-06-09 12:14 PM
Response to Reply #14
15. Same here
Changed in late 80s - early 90s. It threw old people off their rockers!
NO! My phone number didn't change.. you just have to dial ALL 7 numbers now!
Iggo (1000+ posts) Wed May-06-09 12:29 PM
Response to Original message
16. Telephone exchanges.
Out here on the coast (at least in L.A.) when I was a kid it was Richmond 9, or RI9, then the rest of the phone number.
As one might correctly guess, this bonfire's from the lounge on Skins's island.
I went looking for Chief S itting Bull, the bird-smacking stoned red-faced primitive, but as he's in much agony and pain, I'll leave the Chief alone until it's over.
