Re: [telecom] AT&T drops Appleton, WI time/temp service

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>> A Darboy businessman saved a 59-year-old Appleton institution. > > Would anyone know of such time/temp services still available > elsewhere in the U.S.? Bell made a half-hearted effort to > standardize them at 936-1212 but many places had their own number. > Later, some companies charged extra for it and it was a 976 number.

In flat-rate cities Southwestern Bell never provided free time service. That was practically all, maybe all, of Southwestern Bell exchanges.

Time service was available in most cities of any size in SWBT territory, sponsored by some local company which probided an advertising message along with it. In Oklahoma City, the Audichron machine was on the main banking floor of the First National Bank and Trust Company, with blinking lights to show which lines were in use and handsets so customers and visitors to the bank could pick up on the spot and listen to the message. The bank was, of course, the advertiser sponsoring the service. Before divestiture the telco leased or purchased the machine from the Audichron Company and furnished it to the customer as a tariff item or special assembly.

In flat-rate exchanges, there is no revenue stream to the telco for providing the service on its own behalf.

There are five time services listed in the telephone directory for the Oklahoma City metropolitan exchange. Four of them are in smaller cities included in the metro exchange, presumably provided by local advertisers in the respective areas, but of course available to any costomers in the metro exchange.

> Man, that line was in service since 1950 - (memory flow alert!) dial >> telephone service was cut in in Appleton in 1949 and from that time >> until about 1968 or 1969, one only needed to dial the last five >> digits of the number to connect a local call dialed from Appleton >> (733 or 734 numbers). > > Made it easier for SxS exchanges so new levels and expensive switches > didn't need to be added. I believe in such cases if someone dialed a > 7 first it was simply absorbed (ignored).

As I recall, any of the SxS selectors could be arranged to absorb, trunk or cut through on any specified digit. Not used just in small towns but in mtero cities which were SxS.

> That, too, will end in a couple of years when NPA 274 comes to the >> 920 area, requiring that all ten digits of the number be dialed on >> all calls. > > Hard to believe a small town in Wisconsin will require ten digits when > not that long ago five were plenty.

Wes Leatherock snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com snipped-for-privacy@aol.com

***** Moderator's Note *****

Even in flat-rate environments, the telco could earn money from the time signal: it was allways leased to the FAA, police, fire, etc., for use as an independent log signal that was recorded under airport tower transmissions, police dispatchers, etc. I don't know how much they charged for the service.

Bill Horne Temporary Moderator

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Re: [telecom] AT&T drops Appleton, WI time/temp service - local guy picks it up