This question is about the episode in which the Bradys get a pay telephone in the house. Mike was complaining about phone bills the size of the national debt.

Question: Since most local calls cost the same on the monthly telephone bill regardless of how much time you spend on the telephone, did the kids know that many people whose numbers required a long distance charge? I would think that they would have only spoken to children from their school from their suburb in the Los Angeles area, and only if you cross city lines would it be likely to see a spike in your phone bill.

When I lived in Oxford, Ohio, calls to Hamilton (15 miles away) were free, but not Middletown (20 miles away)--at least not in the 1990s. Here in Dayton, calls to Xenia (10 miles away) are free, but not Sidney (40 miles away).

Thoughts, anyone?

:confused: :confused: :confused:

Perhaps the girls' father lived out of state and they were calling him. Just kidding.
Good question James. It could be just a line in the script that wasn't well thought out. A better example would have been the electricity or the water bill. I know we never heard the end of that while growing up.
It could be they had cousins that lived a distance away.

Originally posted by James
This question is about the episode in which the Bradys get a pay telephone in the house. Mike was complaining about phone bills the size of the national debt.

Question: Since most local calls cost the same on the monthly telephone bill regardless of how much time you spend on the telephone, did the kids know that many people whose numbers required a long distance charge? I would think that they would have only spoken to children from their school from their suburb in the Los Angeles area, and only if you cross city lines would it be likely to see a spike in your phone bill.

When I lived in Oxford, Ohio, calls to Hamilton (15 miles away) were free, but not Middletown (20 miles away)--at least not in the 1990s. Here in Dayton, calls to Xenia (10 miles away) are free, but not Sidney (40 miles away).

Thoughts, anyone?

:confused: :confused: :confused: Most phone companies here charge 10.6 cents per call, regardless of its distance...

Maybe the kids knew other kids from another part of town.

Crystal:crazy:

I asked my Mom about this, since she could remember what the phone companies were like in the 70's.

She said (here in S.C. anyway) that they used to charge you a flat fee for so-many minutes, and any calls you make after that (even local) were charged as extras (or "tolls" as Mr. Brady said).

Kind of like the cell phone companies today: you get so many minutes for a flat fee, then you pay through the nose for any extras you use!

I feel that it was not a well thought out remark. They could have scripted it to have Mike complain only about how the kids were tying up the phone line so that calls couldn't be made or received by the adults.

Anyway...

In large cities like Los Angeles there are sections of the area that are blocked out on the map. Anything beyond a certain grid on the map is charged an additional amount of money. This is called a toll charge. It doesn't matter if the phone that you are calling is across the street from you, you get charged more money. The areas are tracked by area code AND by prefix.

Of course, on TV everyone has the same prefix (it's usually "555"), so that doesn't really make any sense! :lol: Oh well.

:)

Don't forget that Marcia, Jan, and Cindy had lived with their grandparents 20 minutes away just a few months before "Sorry, Right Number" took place. Maybe the calls to their old friends were toll calls.