You know, now that you guys have got going on this riff, I do remember letter-number phone numbers being exchanged even when I was old enough to notice such things, which means early 70's. Our home number where I grew up was 967-2652, and I definitely remember my parents giving it out as WO7-2652 and me being told to remember that before going to kindergarten, which would be circa 1971. I also remember when we started saying 967-2652, shortly after that. I'm not sure if that coincided with an ad campaign for area codes and 10-digit dialing or what. I'm pretty sure area codes and 10-digit numbers were in force before then. Where I live now, the long-time exchange was 279, and you still notice on old-timers' fridges and walls that they just have 4-digit numbers written down, the assumption being the first three numbers are 279. In the case of "newer" numbers like my home number (issued 1994), that would be written down 8-XXXX (since the "newer" exchange is 278). I noticed this same trend up where my wife grew up, where the exchanges were 376 (6-XXXX) for the immediate town and 377 (7-XXXX) for most of the surrounding farm land. -- Tom Fine ----- Original Message ----- From: "Richard L. Hess" <[log in to unmask]> To: <[log in to unmask]> Sent: Monday, December 06, 2010 11:25 PM Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] NY City Phone exchanges; was - Tone-Arts Records > Hello, Peter, > > I grew up in Forest Hills--my family owned the same home from 1921 until I sold it in 1981. > > When I was moving in 1981, I found a record (telephone bill) from the 1930s, IIRC, that showed the > telephone number to be BOUlevard 8076. > > When you ended up dialing that, it was 268. One step that seemed to have occurred in the 1940s or > 1950s was the splitting of exchanges (might have occurred sooner). > > If you notice the "U" in BOUlevard is "8" so when they went from BOUlevard to BOulevard 8, the > original numbers did not change. They added at least a BOulevard 3 and one other number, but it > escapes me--I think it was BOulevard 1, but I'm not so sure as I am of BOulevard 3. > > As an aside, someone moving into the neighbourhood did not like getting a phone number that > started with "BO" when he used deodorant, but that's another story. > > In the 1950s we also had LIGgett numbers, and those became LI4 numbers, and then 544--an overlay, > in a sense of the 26x numbers. > > I had 268-8076 until about 1975 when I wanted more features and had to change my number as the 268 > exchange was running on old equipment. The 520 exchange was another overlay and I suspect was an > ESS. > > I took a step backwards when I moved to Aurora, ON, the first time in 1981. I had the original 727 > exchange and, at that time, you could dial people in that exchange by merely dialing four digits. > At that time it was in the 416 area code and dialing Toronto was long distance. > > I did not get touch tone until I moved to Glendale California in 1983 and got a number in the 213 > area code. That was changed within a year or three when the 213 code split off the 818 code. > > When we moved back to Aurora in 2004, no 727 numbers were available. We have three numbers (one > line) in the 751 exchange and my business line is in the 713 exchange. Now this is in the 905 area > code but Toronto is a local call (and the monthly rates are higher, but the calls are cheaper). > Interestingly, while calls from the 905 area code to the 416 area code are local, calls within the > 905 area code across different "spokes" radiating from Toronto are toll calls...so our cell phones > are 416 numbers. > > What is interesting about this is how soon memory fades about how things were and how technology > used to be operated. I'm seeing this already with our magic sound reproduction boxes that appear > to many to be arcane magic rather than simply a former, pervasive technology. I recall most of my > friends knowing how to mount a cartridge in a turntable. Fewer knew how to align a tape > recorder...but some did. > > Cheers, > > Richard > > > > -- > Richard L. Hess email: [log in to unmask] > Aurora, Ontario, Canada (905) 713 6733 1-877-TAPE-FIX > http://www.richardhess.com/tape/contact.htm > Quality tape transfers -- even from hard-to-play tapes. >