June dials 6 digits on telephone

[eyefocus]

On the "Mustache" episode, Wally leaves the house to go over
to Mary Ellen Rogers house and has June call her to tell
her that Wally is on the way.

Funny thing is I counted June dialing only 6 numbers. I know for a fact
back in the 60's they didn't really have many area codes but they
still had to dial 7 digits for a local number.

No biggie on this one...just another flaw we viewers notice.

Cory;) ;) ;)

P.S. Probably many of you already know this but the Cheryl Holdrige playing
the part of Mary Ellen Rogers is also the same Cheryl from the Mickey Mouse
Club Mouseketeers.

[BBF]

I noticed in the ep where the boys call Don Drysdale, Gilbert only dialed 5 digits when he called the meat market to pull a prank phone call.

[UncleBilly]

I can understand dialing the 5 numbers but not the 6 numbers. "Before" my time in our town, if your number was 123-4567, you only had to dial 3-4567 to connect to who you were calling. So that could explain Gilbert dialing 5 numbers.

Of course, if you lived in Mayberry with Andy and the gang you only had to pick up the phone and tell the operator who you wanted to talk to! Phone calls and telephones have changed a lot in the past 40 years.

[BrandonS]

I do know that phone numbers used to have fewer digits, but I thought it was a bit earlier than LITB, although I'm by no means sure of the timeline. I was born in 1953, and phone numbers have been 7 digits for as long as I recall.

[BBF]

Originally posted by UncleBilly
I can understand dialing the 5 numbers but not the 6 numbers. "Before" my time in our town, if your number was 123-4567, you only had to dial 3-4567 to connect to who you were calling. So that could explain Gilbert dialing 5 numbers.


I never knew that...That would be weird.

[TheHappyBurgerMeister]

I didn't notice that when I saw it. Oh, yeah, but it wasn't Mary Ellen Rogers in the ep. it was Julie Foster. Just thought I'd point that out for ya.

[tdr]

The public library in my town has old phone books in this room with geneological records, periodicals on microfilm, et al. It wasn't very long ago that I looked at some of these, and as late as the early 50's they still used only 3 digits for local calls. Then there was a rapid progression to 4 digits, then a digit followed by a dash before 4 digits. By the late 50's local calls did require 7 digits, and the first 2 were always listed as letters. I can remember back to when it was customary to quote a phone number with a name beginning with those letters. In our case, it was LI, often cited as "Lindon." That's another thing we often hear on Beaver or other shows as old, such as I Love Lucy.

On the Andy Griffith Show I think that's really an anachronism having to call the local operator to plug in your line to the one you want to call. But even on AGS they do sometimes mention 3-digit numbers, although that too may have been outdated by the 60's. The reason is probably that the town of Mayberry itself is a bit anachronistic; more simple and easy-going than was reality, which was a large part of the show's attraction in a more complex and not-so-nice world.

[eyefocus]

Isn't it interesting how the number of digits has evolved from the past.
I consider myself probably the "old timer" of the bunch on this board
but I have no problem with that because it's all about having fun
watching TV for entertainment anyway.

The previous post was absolutely correct stating that in the mid-50's
the phone numbers used a "Name" prefix. I remember when in
1954, when I was 5 years old in Chicago, my mother made
me remember my phone number in case I got lost in the city.
My home number had no area code but you would have to tell
someone that my number was UPtown 8-9238. You would see
in the phone books that the first two letters were capitalized and
then a number, a dash, then 4 numbers. When I moved to the Los
Angeles area, my number changed to DAvis 9-2595.

Cory :wave: :wave: :wave:

[FOL85NatandMrsGRock]

how weird, how come now there are no letters? It's only a common first 3 numbered pattern, but mostly a common first number.... here the common first 3 numbers is 434...

[tdr]

Originally posted by FOL85NatandMrsGRock
how weird, how come now there are no letters? It's only a common first 3 numbered pattern, but mostly a common first number.... here the common first 3 numbers is 434...

I can remember back to around 1969 (approx.) when the phone company* stopped listing the first 2 numbers as letters. I'm not really sure of the reason, but my mom-- who worked for the phone company-- said it caused a minor stir in many people who were accustomed to giving or taking numbers that way. There may be more to this than I know, such as how a locale got their 'prefix' and why the used the names which started with those first 2 letters; e.g., Riverside for RI (74); MurrayHill for MU (68).

*Until the 80's A T & T owned the regional 'Bell operating companies', so in the vast majority of areas "the phone company" referred to that particular Bell company. I think it was 1981 when a major judgment against A T & T's monopoly began forcing so much reorganization which since that time has led to mergers and breakoffs and competitions for services, including services which only existed in 'primitive' forms at that time, such as the internet and mobile phones. If an A T & T exec who died in the 1950's returned today, he might not recognize his old company for what it offers and does not offer; controls and does not control.