General Telecommunications Forum History--SF Chronical--telephone photos [telecom]

The San Francisco Chronical's online website, SF Gate, has a section
on historical photos from the newspaper's archives.

They have a series of pictures of various telephones taken over the
years.  They include cord switchboards and examples of new technology
when introduced (ie early cellular car phones, Touch Tone, new pay
phones and booths, various kinds of video phones, and others.)

Photo collection is at:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/thebigevent/detail?entry_id=107304

(Note--it is called "50 years of telephones in San Francisco, but the
time range is actually 20-100 years.)

One of the historical telephone photos in that series at
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/thebigevent/detail?entry_id=107304  
show a Touch-Tone payphone with what appears to be a 2-line
vacuum-fluorescent display.  Does anyone on the list know what that
is?  Is it Caller ID?  I've never seen a payphone with that feature.

-bernieS

** Moderator note:

It appears that Bernie is talking about photo #9 in the series, as it is
the only Touch-Tone pay phone.    The caption indicates it is the first
Touch-Tone pay phone installed in S.F., and is dated Feb 11, 1972.

This pre-dates the deployment of Caller-ID by roughly 15 years, and thus,
that possibility can be safely ruled out.  Leaving the question of "what
IS it for?" unanswered.

I think it's just an instruction card with the light reflecting oddly.
See this phone for sale on eBay which appears to be the same model:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Western-Electric-2D2-Panel-Payphone-/160582439895

R's,
John

On 2/4/2012 10:53 AM, bernieS wrote:

Huh?  It's simply a printed message covered by protective plastic or
glass.

The contents of the alleged "display" (on photo #9) at this URL are:

<http://blog.sfgate.com/thebigevent/2012/02/02/long-distance-fifty-years-of-telephones-in-san-francisco/#2821-9>

1st line: obscured by reflection
2nd line: "LOCAL AND LONG DISTANCE CALLS"
3rd line: 3 words of text too small to read, and arrow points down to the
          receiver hook

I do know my eyesight and color vision is better than 99.9% of the
population, but a person would have to be blind to not see what I
just described above.

:-)

On 2/4/2012 10:53, bernieS wrote:

Nothing particularly unusual -- just the card with the telephone number.
 Note the grey plastic keycaps on the Touch-Tone keypad.  Those didn't
last very long on pay phones due to vandalism.

Compare that phone with the one on the previous photo taken five years
earlier.  A short-lived characteristic of that model is the three coin
slots -- a holdover from the earlier model.  Single coin slots and dial
tone first (the ability to dial emergency and alternate billed calls
without coins) were often prerequisites to price increases on pay phones.