The Telephone Goes To War, 1930-1950
Clumbsum, Grunts, and Squeaks
Power of Insulators
Added later were bubbles to the bottoms and skirts to the inside of the insulators. The bubbles helped water drip off faster, cutting down on rust. Skirts kept dust from the pins. Both dust and rust interfered with clear transmission and kept the customers from hearing well.
The Telephone and World War II
What was striking was the immediacy and informality of talking over the telephone - the two traits which distinguish the telephone from any other form of communication, whether it was a call to a neighbor to trade gossip or call to a President to announce the outbreak of a war.
The War Production Board issued an order in 1942 to limit telephone installations throughout the country during the war. This limit placed the development of local telephone business behind but the telephone became increasingly important.
After the outbreak of WWII, long distance calls increased. Men waited in long lines at military camps to make calls home. Operators in major cities were instructed to ask customers to keep their calls short. The recommended time was five minutes.
Newspaper ads read: “You can give them a lift in more ways than one if you will go easy on Long Distance between 7 and 10 each night. That’s the time many servicemen in the camps are calling home and they’ll appreciate your help in leaving the line for them.”
After World War II the telephone became a necessity for Americans rather than a luxury. As a result, 97,000 telephones were installed in 1947 and 123,000 unfilled orders remained at year-end.
Phones During the Depression
Single men who worked for the telephone gave up their jobs so men with families could keep working. Those people with families were given only 3 days of work a week, and their pay slashed.
Throughout the Depression, women who worked for the telephone company were required to quit if their husbands also began working for the company. The company thought if only one member of the family worked, more people might have a chance to make a living for their families.
Phones of the Period
Automatic Electric Desk Type Dial Monophone (1934 and later)
The first of this type was manufactured in the 1930s. The type 35A actually predated the type 50. It did not have the vent openings on the side, only the bottom. Later models did have the vents on the sides so the customer could hear the bell better.
This phone was capable of picking up two lines with a separate hold button for each line. The small button on the right front side of the cradle was used to buzz another extension.
A two-point transposition bracket was used to rotate the wires so noise would not be created in the circuit.
These tools were used for twisting open wire lines utilized for toll and rural lines.
This machine was used to find shorts and grounds on cable pairs in lead covered cables.
Cable splicers and combination men used these to located cable faults (shorts, crosses, grounds and opens.) Two men - one to work the locator and the other to climb the pole, using a grunt box, locator coil, and headset - could identify the type of trouble and its location in the cable.