> In the 1970s, I knew people at non-Bell independents who used circle
>> digits, the extra digit to identify the calling phone. There was also
>> a surprising amount of ONI, operators cutting in to ask for your
>> number, even on private lines in Bell territory before ANI was
>> universal.
> Why the name "circle" digit?
It was displayed in a circle on the card in the middle of the dial above or below your phone number.
In the 1970s and 1980s my sister in law in Ghent NY had a circle digit even though she had a private line, so toll calls were 11-number where the second 1 was the circle digit.
Regards,
John Levine snipped-for-privacy@iecc.com Primary Perpetrator of The Internet for Dummies Information Superhighwayman wanna-be,
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