Teacher
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17 Messages
Phone trivia:what was a party line?
A party line was a shared landline connection among a number of homes in a neighborhood.There just weren’t enough telephone lines to go around.
If I remember correctly each number had its distinctive ring.
2 big negatives were your neighbors listening into your converation(usually given away by a tell tale click when they lifted their reciever) and having gabby neighbors that wouldn’t get off that shared line. You could pick up your handset to ask them to hang up but that could lead to them becoming angry.
ATTDanW
Former Employee
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50 Messages
6 years ago
Wow, that's a blast from the past! The area I grew up in had party lines through the early '80s -- we were a bit off the beaten path. It's hard to imagine party lines now, when it's common to have multiple mobile lines in a single household. For those that can't imagine it, though, I found this video from the AT&T Archives about party line etiquette.
And incidentally it's also kind of hard to imagine a time when public service messages ran 14 minutes long and featured creepy marionettes -- that pre-dates even me!
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joe94611
Teacher
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17 Messages
6 years ago
Thanks for the AT&T video from another time.
Party lines are long gone(most people are glad they are) and I haven’t seen program w marionettes recently.
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joe94611
Teacher
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17 Messages
6 years ago
Hi ATTDanW
I am impressed that AT&T would spend money to digitize for historical purposes a1946 film about party line etiquette.Furthermore, storing film reels for 50+ years is expensive.
It takes a apecial company to care about &share its history.
Joe
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ATTDanW
Former Employee
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50 Messages
6 years ago
Thanks, Joe. Yes, AT&T certainly has a lot of history, and it's not just the history of a company, but also of telecommunications. I love watching those old clips, and I'm glad they're preserved!
Dan
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Famousnate187
Mentor
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46 Messages
6 years ago
Great stuff this is telecom history!
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