Naming Exchanges

by Jeff Vorzimmer

I recently came across a web site for which the sole purpose was to preserve and catalog old telephone exchange names.

Such Quixotic ventures are not uncommon these days on the World Wide Web, so I wasn't that surprised by it.  But the author of the site, Robert Crowe, seems committed to cataloging every exchange ever used in every large city in the U.S.  What makes this task so daunting is the simple fact that named exchanges haven't been used in the United States in over 35 years.

In fact, many readers probably don't even know what I'm talking about.  Let me explain...

Back in the dark ages of telephony, before 1921, before phones even had dials on them, one had to pick up the receiver and tap on the switch hook a few times to get the operator's attention.  When she got on the line you would give her the number you wanted to call, such as Spring 3456 or Pennsylvania 5000, and she would connect you.

Once dials started appearing on phones, a caller could dial the number himself by first dialing the first three letters of the exchange and then the number.  For example the caller would dial the S-P-R in Spring and then the 3456 or the P-E-N in Pennsylvania 5000.  In those days phone numbers were written with the dialed letters capitalized such as SPRing 3456 and PENnsylvania 5000.

By the 1930s, large cities were dropping the third letter from the dialing routine and replacing it with a number, in order to increase the available numbers for each exchange.  So numbers such as SPRing 3456 would become SPring 7-3456 and PENnsylvania 5000 would become PEnnsylvania 6-5000.  This simple change added 80,000 new numbers to existing exchanges.

For 40 years, Americans used named exchanges when making calls, but eventually Bell Telephone began phasing out the names in the late 1950s and early 1960s for various reasons such as the fact that the names could be confusing or difficult to spell and for the fact that European phones didn't have letters on them, so it would make direct dialing from there difficult, if not impossible.

On his web page, Robert Crowe explains his venture, entitled, aptly enough, he Telephone EXchange Name Project (ourwebhome.com/TENP/TENproject.html).  He explains that his purpose is to catalog these exchanges, to actually use them and to elicit contributions, presumably from those old enough to know what the hell he's talking about.

One section of his manifesto reads, "Why do we care?"  Good question.  He explains, "Partly because we want to resist the increasing trend towards digitizing our lives."  Aha!  Luddites!  "They're also a link to our more analog past which is fast slipping away," he goes on to say.  I'm not sure how the use of letters for the first two digits of my phone number puts me in touch with my analog past.  I don't feel any more or less analog when I dial 1-800-GOOD LAWYER.  I just have to hunt and peck at the telephone keypad as if it were a typewriter.

One aspect of the project that can't be over-looked, though, is the attempt at historical documentation of telephone exchanges that played such a big part in the daily lives of Americans for so many years.  I also have to admit I found the site quite interesting when I started exploring it.  He has Bell Telephone's 1955 list of recommended exchange names, which only had been posted at the TELECOM Digest site.  He has also carefully documented the comments of those people who contributed exchanges to the catalog.

He has a matrix of all the possible two-digit combinations with which an exchange can start.  You just press the link that corresponds to the first two digits of your number and, voilà, you have a list of hundreds of exchange names that were actually used at one time, as well as a list of cities where each was used.  All the New York City and Brooklyn exchanges I knew about were listed and I realized my current exchange was the old Coney Island exchange, ESplanade.  Maybe I'll use it on my business card for that retro look.

As I became nostalgic for an era I never knew, I put on a Glenn Miller album (vinyl of course) and moved the arm to PEnnsylvania 6-5000, the 1940 song that featured the number of the Hotel Pennsylvania, across the street from Penn Station in New York City.  It was the number to call to make reservations at the Cafe Rouge, located in the hotel, where Miller and his band often played.

Someone had told me not too long ago that it was still the number of the Hotel Pennsylvania.  I decided to give it a call - the old fashioned way.  I picked up the phone and dialed 0.

"Operator, get me PEnnsylvania 6-5000 in New York City, please."

"Excuse me?"

"I would like to be connected to the number PEnnsylvania 6-5000 in New York City."

Silence.

"Operator?"

"You would like me to connect you?"

"Yes."

"To P-E-6-5000 in New York?"

Yes, that's right."

"You understand there will be an additional charge for an operator-assisted call?"

"That's fine," I said, wondering how much of an additional charge.

"Please hold for your party, sir."

The number rang and an automated voice announced that I had indeed reached the Hotel Pennsylvania and gave me various menu choices.  I turned down my stereo in order to be able to better hear the music playing in the background behind the automated voice which ran down the menu options.  It was PEnnsylvania 6-5000!

Robert Crowe might be pleased to know at least that operators are backwardly compatible with what he calls the old analog system, although the operator I got seemed old enough to have been working since the 1950s.  I guess it's good to know that we still have defenders of lost causes, like Don Quixote.