Re: Color 3 Slot Payphones?

Sep 11, 2006 0 Replies


It is possible they were GTE. GTE's clone of AT&T's manufacturing arm


> Western Electric, was called "Automatic Electric" and GTE pay phones
> were beige; I never saw any other color.

Automatic Electric sold equipment to a variety of "independent" telephone companies, not just GTE.


Anyway, Western Electric did make beige and green pay phones.


It's pretty easy to spot an AE vs WE telephone set: Western Electric phones have the finger spot at the 3 o'clock position while AE phones have it at the 5 o'clock position.


[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Plus which, on (at least the older) AE rotary dial phones, the dial would return 'faster' when you removed your finger. WE dials pulsed and clicked their way back. PAT]

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