A rotary dial phone

[davidpizzica]

I wonder how many people remember those? I hooked one up today temporarily because my cordless phone passed away. I think this one is vintage 1963! I'll have to get used to the dial for a week until I get paid this friday and can buy a new cordless phone. What an antique!

[Freedom]

I giggle when I see them as I am watching old movies!

I have several in the cellar for 'emergencies." :rolleyes:

[lvpets2002]

:) Oh yes I remember the black ones with the receiver on top.. I also remember having Switch Boards && Party Lines.. They were bummerrss..

[Moesha]

I saw one sitting out somewhere the other day. It wasn't plugged in though. Then I was using a phone at the same place and heard the rotary dialing. Someone had changed the phone from tone to pulse. (or pulse to tone whichever one it is.) None of my phones here have that option anymore. Not anywhere that I can find anyway. BTW I changed the phone back to tone.

[Karen]

We had one for all my growing up years - my town was one of the last to get "touch tone" dialing capability. And we do still have a rotary phone in the basement of this house, it isn't hooked up, but could be if we needed it!

[cassiesmom]

Until about 6 months ago, there was an avocado green rotary dial telephone in the spare bedroom at my mom and dad's house. It even had the "word" phone sticker on it - remember those? In my case, growing up it was "GU-4" for Gunderson, but I don't know how they came up with the words. When my youngest niece was able to dial a push button phone, they were visiting grandma and granddad. My niece needed to phone her best friend. She went into the spare bedroom, took one look at the phone and said "How do you use this thing?" (Grandma and granddad have a cordless phone in the kitchen by the way) Back in the day the telephone came from the telephone company - you didn't go purchase one. I also remember when Illinois Bell used to charge more for service if you had a touch tone phone. The green phone has been replaced with a little push button phone, one that's not cordless. But we still laugh over "How do you use this thing?!" even though my niece gets so embarrassed when we tell the story!

[Husky_mom]

they sure were made to flip you out of your mind..... LOL.......

now that we have to dial up to 13 numbers (for cellphone) it would be the cause of serious stress having misdialed the last number......LMAO

I did enjoyed them at the time you only dialed like 5 numbers......oh those times.... adn I loved when the parents removed the dialing disk to "prevent" us from dialing.......ROFLMAO... little did they know we still could dial!!... just by clicking the thingies were you hang up for the numbers you wanted to dial

example: number 12345

one click pause two clicks pause three clicks pause...and so on AND you get the actual number you "dialed".... :D

[Rachel]

I actually have nightmares about trying to dial on a dial phone (in an emergency), making a mistake, and having to start all over again. I takes forever to dial a number and that was when I only had 7 numbers to dial.

When I was growing up our phone number had only 4 numbers and I still remember it, although I can't remember any of the numbers I had subsequently. I probably had a dial phone longer than most people because of that *extra charge* they used to have for touch tone.

[Freckles]

I have a 1982 version rotary in my bedroom. Don't dial out too often, but receive many calls.

[chocolatepuppy]

I remember them. ;)

[Medusa]

My sister Shirley still has one. She doesn't have long distance calling either and I asked her why not and she said "Who would I call?" I said "Me!" She said "Why? You always call me." Of course, no cell phone or computer either. I told her that when I visit her I jokingly tell my friends that I'm going into the time warp, so if they never hear of me again, they'll know why. I'll bet somewhere in her place there's a wringer washing machine, too. Must be a Pittsburgh thing, David. :rolleyes: She also has the furniture that she got when she married in 1953 and it looks as new as it did the day she bought it.

[Catlady711]

We had a rotary for many years growing up, a big white one with a 25' coiled cord and a 50' jack cord, it's long since faded to an antique white. I think mom got it back in the late 60's - early 70's.

Later we kept it around in case the power went out (cordless phones don't work without power). My mom eventually gave it to me (went for a cell phone), and I just kept it to test the phone jack line if we had phone problems.

When we got rid of the home phone service here we no longer had a use for it. Some friends were having a school play where they needed a stage prop of an old fashioned rotary phone, so we donated our fully functioning phone to the school as a stage prop. :p

[moosmom]

David,

Try the Salvation Army or Goodwill. Alot of people have turned them in.

Talk about antique...ROTARY :eek:

[Grace]

Oh, I remember. Black rotary dial, hard wired into the house. Party line. And you could only get a phone from the phone company. Nowadays, you can buy one in a drug store - among other places.

I even remember our phone number - Hillsgrove 1-1147R.

[ramanth]

I think my Inlaws still have one. I remember them! :D

[DJFyrewolf36]

We used one that was built in the 80's when we first moved here before we managed to get a touch tone phone. The ringer on that thing makes me jump out of my skin every time it rings lol.

[davidpizzica]

David,

Try the Salvation Army or Goodwill. Alot of people have turned them in.

Talk about antique...ROTARY :eek:
At least you can call me this week without the phone cutting out, beautiful! Next stop wal-mart to buy a GOOD phone.

[Karen]

My sister Shirley still has one. She doesn't have long distance calling either and I asked her why not and she said "Who would I call?" I said "Me!" She said "Why? You always call me." Of course, no cell phone or computer either. I told her that when I visit her I jokingly tell my friends that I'm going into the time warp, so if they never hear of me again, they'll know why. I'll bet somewhere in her place there's a wringer washing machine, too. Must be a Pittsburgh thing, David.

Um, careful there. I've never even been to Pittsburgh, and there's a wringer and a washboard in my basement!

[Randi]

I remember the old dial ones too. My aunt had one of those and four families shared the line, I even remeber her no. BE 3647y, you dialed BE (for Bella) then told the operator the number. I attached a picture of the one she had.

The next one is older, and I must admit, I would not know how to use it. :o However, when I was 17 I worked for a big Taxi company and operated a switchboard looking like the one on the forth picture.

John used to have one like the red - also attached. He sold it to a colletor.

Some of these had a loud ringing tone and almost made you jump! :eek:

I still have a little black plastic phone from my childhood.

To call the police or an ambulance for emergency, you dialed 000, which was quite smart, as the cero's was first on the dial, so quick to do.

A few years ago, they changed it to 112, which I find rather irritating. When I called an ambulance for John, I was so upset, confused etc. that I first dialed 000. Of course, they then told you what to dial.

[Medusa]

Um, careful there. I've never even been to Pittsburgh, and there's a wringer and a washboard in my basement!
LOL, that's funny! Probably the difference is that my sister actually uses hers. Plus she still wears her hair in a huge beehive like Marge Simpson.

Randi, I remember the old prefixes, now that you mention it. Ours was OR for Orchard. Goodness, the memories this has brought back!

[Pam]

Yes I remember the old rotary phones too. In fact there is one in our basement right now (hubby never throws anything out without me begging :rolleyes: :D ) I can still remember picking up the phone when I was a child and hearing an operator say...."number please.." and our phone number started with ME for Melrose. Thanks for the little trip down memory lane. :)

[pitc9]

My dad still uses one in his garage!!
It's the funniest thing!
It's brown too!!

Growning up we had a yellow one in the kitchen with a SUPER long cord so we could reach the bathroom and shut the door for private phone conversations. :D With 4 girls in the house, that was done all the time! My parent's finally put a phone booth sign on the bathroom door!

[kitten645]

Really funny...at a trade show recently I saw someone who is selling a rotary phone you can plug into your cell phone! LOL! :D You just plug it in and you can use it like the old rotary phone. I still have fond memories of my light blue princess phone I grew up with.
Claudia

[Ginger's Mom]

Ah yes, Devonshire (DE) was our exchange. I really do miss those old exchanges. They were so nice and homey. It's funny we think of rotary phones as so slow now, and in a few more years we will probably think of dialing at all as being slow. We will all be used to just saying "call (whomever)," and the phone will connect. :)

[davidpizzica]

My sister Shirley still has one. She doesn't have long distance calling either and I asked her why not and she said "Who would I call?" I said "Me!" She said "Why? You always call me." Of course, no cell phone or computer either. I told her that when I visit her I jokingly tell my friends that I'm going into the time warp, so if they never hear of me again, they'll know why. I'll bet somewhere in her place there's a wringer washing machine, too. Must be a Pittsburgh thing, David. :rolleyes: She also has the furniture that she got when she married in 1953 and it looks as new as it did the day she bought it.
It could be a Pittsburgh or a Penn Hills thing, Mary! I have the rotary phone, and I still have an 8-track player and tapes and those big round things called LPs. People here don't throw ANYTHING away. I do have one concession to the 21st century, an MP3 player! BTW, Mary what part of Pittsburgh did you live?

[Randi]

Oh David, do you really have one of the old taperecorders! I need a 4 track one for all my favourite tapes I kept all these years. I also have lots of LP's filling up a whole bookshelf - some were John's though. He made the covers for some of them. I just can't throw them out, but I can still play them! :D I have a little music system which can play LP's, CD's, tapes - and there's a radio too. :)

In my opinion, things go just a tad too fast these days. I'll have to get a new TV within a year, or I won't be able to watch anything!

[cassiesmom]

We used one that was built in the 80's when we first moved here before we managed to get a touch tone phone. The ringer on that thing makes me jump out of my skin every time it rings lol.
Fyrewolf36, my mom and dad have a phone with a ringer like that! Every time I'm there, and the phone rings, I jump because it's so incredibly LOUD.

[Catlady711]

I don't remember the days of having letters in the phone numbers but my mom does. I can remember only 5 digit phone numbers though. My grandma used to work at the switchboard for the telephone company many years ago, I mean a real switchboard with the pegs and holes for connecting calls. lol

We used to have an 8-track player, but it died and we could not find anyone around here that could fix it, so we sold it at a garage sale with the tapes we had. I still miss that thing.

I still have a ton of 33 1/3 and 45 records. My cousin keeps calling them black funny looking cd's. ROFL

I have a ton of cassette tapes also. The car dealer thought I was nuts when I bought my last car. It came with a cd player in it. When I asked if they had a cd/tape combo player available he said no it was tape or cd only. I told them to take the cd player out and put a tape player in. He kept arguing with me saying 'you know that's a downgrade don't you?'. Sheesh most of my music was on tapes, why spend more money to buy everything again on cd's, it's easier to just downgrade the car stereo. lol

We do have mp3's and cd's though so we're not toally 'retro' lol.

[jennielynn1970]

I have one from my first apartment in Bethlehem. It is ancient! It weighs a ton too... at least 8lbs. I had replaced it when I moved in, but I still have it with me.

[Twisterdog]

In cleaning out my dad's basement, I found our old tan one that was on the wall when I was growing up.

On the little round plate in the middle of dial, it still had our phone number ... but instead of the first two numbers it had EM. My older sister said this stood for "empire".

[jennielynn1970]

On the little round plate in the middle of dial, it still had our phone number ... but instead of the first two numbers it had EM. My older sister said this stood for "empire".

Mine has the letters as well, UN (was for university think it was).