Crank Phones
The farmhouse on Old Creamery Road south of Dexter, Iowa, had a crank phone, the first one I can remember. Our number was 5211, our ring was “four shorts.” Yes, a party line with several other neighbors.
We had to ring “Central” and give her the number we wanted, so she could connect our phones. When there was a fire or other emergency, Central just kept ringing on the line to get everyone’s attention, then when enough people were listening in, she’d relay the information.
The local Dexter exchange operated as a mutual company until 1960, when it was sold to the Central Iowa Rural Telephone Company. The summer of 1961, a new building (which housed the new automatic equipment) was built just north of the telephone office.
Dexter’s new dial phone system went active on May 8, 1962, with New Kellogg K-60 Crossbar Terminal Equipment, fully-selective ringing, automatic time cut-off, and colored phones available.
Dial Phones
So Dad could tear down the old farm house and build a new smaller house, we moved three miles away and rented the “Brown house,” which had an outhouse. While we lived there we got our first dial phone. I was a senior in high school.
Long-distance rates went down in the evening, so if you anticipated a longer chat with Grandma, etc., you just waited to make the call.
I soon went off to college (1962), the State College of Iowa (now the University of Northern Iowa), where communal phones were in the hallway. If a phone rang, anyone could answer it and find whoever the call was meant for, or she’d take a message and leave it for her dormmate.
One college mate, who hitchhiked back and forth to college, would call home “collect,” through the operator, after he arrived at the campus. When a family member answered, the operator said there was a collect call from him for a fictitious name, and asked if they’d accept the charges. No one by that name was available, but that way his folks knew he’d arrived okay without having to pay for phone call.
After I was married and Guy joined the US Air Force, we moved to Idaho where we lived in a trailer court. We couldn’t afford a phone so our folks would call the office, at the other end of the court. Gus or Libbie (owners) would bring us the message. We used their phone to call home, then paid them for the long-distance charge. I didn’t get a job at first because we thought Guy would be ordered somewhere else fairly quickly. He didn’t, so I got a job as a substitute teacher and we had a phone installed. Yes, he got orders for Vietnam shortly after that.
I’d always hoped to inherit the folks’ old crank phone, just for fun, but they tossed it out along with other items I’d liked as a child, such as oil lamps. “If you had to use them as a child, you’d get rid of them too,” according to my mother. I mentioned it one day when we were at Guy’s folks. His dad said there was a crank phone in the attic we could have. We’ve hauled it around ever since, but didn’t have room to display it until we added on to this house in the early 2000s.
We’ve had a landline phone in our Colorado home and also here in Iowa. Confession: I don’t chatting on the phone. When we had a den of Cub Scouts and I needed to convey messages to the families for a den meeting, I hired son Dan to make the calls. Ten cents each. It worked in those days. (As you can imagine, I really took to email!)
Recently our old landline was discontinued. Favorite Guy insisted on keeping a landline, but this atrocity they installed is so loud, and we haven’t figured out how to keep it from beeping every time you touch a button. There’s also a lag when you’re talking, just like calling Europe, making things even worse because you tend to talk over each other.
When the power went out, the old landline still worked. This one doesn’t.
Cellphones
A red dial phone is part of our decor, just for fun like the crank phone, and more stuff to downsize.
I don’t suppose any of you still have landline phones. . .