“Call by number, it’s twice as fast”
this post was submitted on 18 Jul 2026
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It's actually amazing what you had to convince people to do. On Youtube is a film from 1940 about how to use these newfangled dials on telephones, framed as a granddaughter teaching her grandfather because she's the only one he won't curmudgeon.
There was something of a rebellion against the Zone Improvement Plan, that using ZIP codes would somehow drain the humanity out of the country instead of, you know, making mail easier to sort.
I had to look up curmudgeon, and then niggard
what whild ride that was
Yeah I was trying to be creative there.
A "curmudgeon" is a stubborn, cranky, usually old person. The word bears some resemblance to "bludgeon", which is both a noun meaning a blunt force weapon, a club or cudgel, OR a verb meaning to attack or hit someone with such a weapon. Thus treating "curmudgeon" as a verb should mean to cantankerously complain about/at/to someone. "I asked grampa if he remembered to take his life alert pendant with him and I got curmudgeoned."
Twice as fast as what?
Twice as fast as what?
As NOT using digit dialing!
Phones were around for a long time before you could just pick one up and dial a number of somebody halfway across the country to call them like magic. That's a fairly newfangled way! Before that, there was no direct dialing. An operator at a switchboard at the phone company had to physically plug a cable to connect your phone line to your callee's phone line. You had to talk to the operator to ask them to do that!
In the very early days, you would ask for the other party by name, and the operator would look up the right jack that way. Eventually, there were exchanges, and you might ask for a particular party at "Garfield 7", or "Madison 3". Those are the names in the Allan Sherman song I linked below, that he is complaining about losing due to the move to digit dialing. Which is also what this ad is about - trying to get the public on board with it.
Digit dialing was not totally rolled out until the 1960's, although it was partial before that. New York City had switchboard operators in the 1880's. So the way you are used to, of simply entering a number to reach someone, has been the universal method for much less than half the time telephones have existed!
Editing, here is a photo of switchboard operators plugging cables in the 1950's. But clear back in the 1880's, it happened like that, but more primitive of course than the 1950 photo here.
Using an operator?
"What would I need a tell-a-fone for?"
Fancy doohikeys it’s just a fad
Expected guests are just welcome. unexpected ones are unwelcome
Before mobile phones, it was common to visit friends unanonced, if you happened to be in their neighborhood on a saturday afternoon, for example. It feels so long ago.
My mother grew up in a different country.
When I grew up she told me "In my birth country it's perfectly acceptable and normal to show up unannounced, but here in (this country) you always have to call first".
She thought it was bogus and just so people could vacuum before the guests arrived. The whole discussion was about vacuuming before or after guests, which is quite the topic for another day.
Later in my life I asked my cousins in that country about it, and they'd never heard of the concept of visiting unannounced.
Anyway, yes it's like the change that happened with cell phones. In the country that I grew up in, you'd make an agreement and stick to it. In the country that I live in now (which is the same country) it's expected that people message on their way.
Maybe I just have a bad family :(
1959 wasn't even that long ago fuuuu
Like yeah it's coming up on 100 years in..... Ugghhhhhhhh only 30 years wtfffffffff
yup