"NUMBER PLEASE”

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 9, Issue 89, 21 June 1946, Page 5

"NUMBER PLEASE”

WHAKATANE TELEPHONE EXCHANGE THE INSIDE STORY To everyone except perhaps the very hermity of hermits, a telephone today is a common thing. It is a convenience when one wishes to contact friends; an inconvenience when one wishes to sleep; a consoling instrument when it goes right; an exasperating instrument when it goes wrong; it is all these things and more, but above all, it is sublimely, almost ridiculously easy to operate. One simply turns the handle, murmers .a number (pleasantly if possible) into the receiver, and the next moment learns that the favourite didn’t come in after all.

But how many have ever stopped to think just what makes it possible to learn this disheartening news so shortly after it has happened? Having tracked down all the murderers, married all the beautiful girls, drunk all the gin, scooped all the scoops, and generally completed everything after the manner in movie reporters, one of our own news noses began twitching when the colossal brain behind it suddenly began to wonder just exactly what did happen at ‘Central’ when a number was asked for. From here, we take up the story in person.

A ‘Slack’ Period

The Exchange occupies the rear wing of the Post Office, and the switchboards and fuses fill the larger portion thereof. At the time of our visit, three operators were working at top speed, but the Supervisor took care to explain that this was a ‘slack’ period, and that when things beame really busy, five operators were kept constantly on the go. First impression whs of a large board filled with a maize of small holes, some of which had plugs on the end of leads therein. Above this was another board with a further maize of small steel shutters each about as large as a sixpense, which dropped down indiscriminately here and there, each to display a num-’ ber one, two and three at a time, and which were flipped shut again by the operators almost immediately. The whole atmosphere was one of voices—“ Number Please!” “Sorry, line engaged!” “Through!” and of ceurse the interminable “Working?” “Working?” “Working?” Each operator wore a headphone and microphone set combined.

“Through” Explaining the system, the Supervisor demonstrated for our benefit how when a ring came through, the contact which held the shutter concealing the number of that particular subscriber was broken, allowing the shutter to fall and display the number to the operator. Two rows of leads with plugs attached in front of each operator were arranged in pairs. The operator took one plug, and inserting it in the hole on the board below (indicated by the number), asked the familiar “Number Please!” If the subscriber for instance requested number “One one eleven one double one one (please)”, the plug’s mate went into that particular hole, and the connection was made. One board and operator was devoted entirely to toll calls. At times during YJ Day, every plug was in use. There was also a rather awe-in-spiring array of fuses which overwhelmed everything in one corner of the room, and the Supervisor explained that during a thunderstorm, it was no uncommon thing to have lightning crackling and hissing all round that particular corner. The back of a switchboard was also taken off, and the various workings explained. “Ah yes!” we murmured, with the air of a Borneo headhunter who has just had the theory of atomic power explained to him in fluent Hindustani, and quietly folded our tent and crept away.

One Suffices Whether our visit to ‘Central’ increased our field of scientific knowledge to much of a degree is a debatable point. One thing we did learn, however, and that was that once the first ring has been. put through to the Exchange, and the shutter drops, contact is broken. Further ringing is as useless as trying to kill a horse already dead, for unless the unfortunate operator happens to plug in at the crucial moment, it simply does not register. Our visit likewise had one other

effect. Every time we ring up, we immediately visualise three operators all using eyes, ears, voice and both hands altogether, constantly, without a moment’s respite, and when we feel the urge to viciously ring again, swing on the handle of the pencil sharpener instead.