Anyone remember what this is? It actually works.
DaveSchmidt said:
It’s a rotary dial, is what it is. Where do I press it?
Coin return button?
Formerlyjerseyjack said:
Note the tin back wall and bi-fold door.
every once in a while a local drunk would go in there… close the door and confess all his sins…
Formerlyjerseyjack said:
In Aunt Chubby’s, Hillsboro, N.J.
it actually works?
I didn't realize the current telephone network recognizes rotary dial input.
I took down my rotary dial last year because the wiring may have been affecting other lines. But the rotary part still worked I think - now I want to rewire it and test it out.
Jaytee said:
every once in a while a local drunk would go in there… close the door and confess all his sins…
Ah but did he get absolution?
There were two telephone booths in the my parents candy store in Brooklyn which was the phone link to many of the tenants in the apartment house above the store as well as in the neighborhood— major reason was phones were not available (rationed) to civilians under wartime restrictions. I often had to go out to call the folks who lived in the apartment to the phone (rain, sleet or hail) to tell them there was a call waiting.
Incidentally, party lines were more often the choice for at home phone connections — pick up the receiver and if you heard voices, hang up and try again later.
Opps, sorry, I have been told that real life recall is unwelcome here. But my 94 year old brain (warehouse of experience) sometimes spills out such recollections — like Netflick pays writers to recreate stories from decades past — under the impression that knowledge is power.
mtierney said:
Opps, sorry, I have been told that real life recall is unwelcome here.
When off the phone, we used to call this a hang-up.
DaveSchmidt said:
When off the phone, we used to call this a hang-up.
Hanging up the phone used to be much more emotionally satisfying. Those super solid phones, both the ones at home and in the phone booths, could provide a very cathartic bang if you were angry or frustrated with the person you were talking to. Unhelpful customer service? Bang! Mom not picking up at home when she forgot to pick you up after practice? Bang!! Boyfriend forgot your three-month anniversary date at Dairy Queen? BANG!!
Pushing the hang up button on your smartphone isn’t nearly as satisfying.
There is a pay phone by the Phillips 66 gas station on Springfield Ave in Maplewood.
Someone convince me that this was not peak telecommunications design. The Westinghouse 500. If you had a phone in your house from the 50s to the 80s it looked like this.
If you got a phone call it didn’t matter where you were in your home. The very timbers of the house would vibrate along with the bell inside this glorious device.
Any emotion you were feeling would be expressed in how you dialed. Feeling nervous? Anyone watching you dial could tell. Happy and excited? Easy to see. Angry? This phone was ready to express it.
On the other hand, those extra seconds that you took to dial? Waiting for the rotary to spin back to the neutral position? Maybe it gave you the few seconds you needed to calm down, or stop yourself before dialing your ex, or realize that you haven’t looked everywhere before calling your mom at work to ask where your shoes are. Now you just tell Siri you want to talk to someone (or send a text message) and it’s done. No cooling-off period. They’ll know you were calling even if you hit the disconnect button before it starts ringing.
And like I was saying before … do you remember how good it felt to slam the handset back into the cradle, maybe getting that little “ding”, after a particularly frustrating or infuriating conversation? Try that with an iPhone.
Lastly, these things were more reliable than just about anything. Connect a Westinghouse 500 to copper wires and you have a line of communication that would survive almost anything. Including being slammed down in rage. Dropped call? What?!? Not with this beauty.
"Now you just tell Siri you want to talk to someone (or send a text message) and it’s done."
Minor problem here in Wisconsin when someone in need of a burger or frozen custard tells Siri to call Kopp's. 
mrincredible said:
Someone convince me that this was not peak telecommunications design. The Westinghouse 500. If you had a phone in your house from the 50s to the 80s it looked like this.
Ha! I found the exact same pic but forgot to upload it. I was just too self-satisfied with my humorous musings.
Unless you had a mom who took interior decorating classes in adult extension, in which case you might have had a color coordinated Princess Phone. I am pretty sure my mom still has something very close to the old princess phones on her kitchen wall.
mrincredible said:
Someone convince me that this was not peak telecommunications design. The Westinghouse 500. If you had a phone in your house from the 50s to the 80s it looked like this.
mrincredible said:
Rotary or touch tone?
The one she has now is touch, but we had rotary princess phones when I was a kid.
I remember when the touch tones came out ... they seemed very space age! I also remember people fooling around playing simple tunes on them.
yahooyahoo said:
There is a pay phone by the Phillips 66 gas station on Springfield Ave in Maplewood.
Is it in a booth?
I recall a certain party - no one on M.O.L. who got in an argument while on the phone. One or the other slammed the phone down. the other called and slammed her phone down. That continued for about 10 minutes.
Now there's perseverance.
Formerlyjerseyjack said:
yahooyahoo said:
There is a pay phone by the Phillips 66 gas station on Springfield Ave in Maplewood.
Is it in a booth?
No. It's similar to this photo.
Growing up in the 1950's in western Pa, this was the phone that we had on the wall. I still remember our ring, two longs and one short.
wedjet said:
Growing up in the 1950's in western Pa, this was the phone that we had on the wall. I still remember our ring, two longs and one short.
Was it a party line?
Millburn - it was '53 or 54 when dial phones were introduced to the local towns. I was in 7th or 8th grade and we had an assembly program where there was a BIG dial on state and some guy explaining that Millburn 6- 0209 J was going to be Dr(exel) 9-5127. Summit's exchange was CRestview, Florham Park was FRontier. Thems all I remember.
mrincredible said:
wedjet said:
Growing up in the 1950's in western Pa, this was the phone that we had on the wall. I still remember our ring, two longs and one short.
Was it a party line?
Yes, and each household had its own distinctive ring.
It’s remarkable how far things have come in a few decades. My wife remembers a vacation house in the Poconos with a party line as recently as the 70s. By the 90s/early 2000s almost all of us were carrying a personal wireless device that let us punch in 10 numbers and directly reach almost anyone else. And then within a few more years we’re all carrying fully loaded computers.
Still I am going to make it a point to look for existing payphones and, if possible, see if they still work.
In Aunt Chubby’s, Hillsboro, N.J.