Nation at Your Fingertips, The (1951)

across the Hudson River from New York City and Westward into the state of New Jersey is the city of Anglewood Anglewood could be any one of hundreds of American communities population 25,000 Main Street with busy stores Banks and movie theaters attractive suburban homes with their neat Lawns and their well-groomed look in size and in the kind of people who live here Anglewood is like many other American towns and that was one of the reasons it has become the first town in the world to have an unusual kind of telephone service oh I'll go see who it is you finish your coffee John I'll answer it probably the [Music] mailman John is from Sally she says the baby has the measles oh dear here well now measles that's not so serious all kids get them sooner or later John Warren you know ruy is only 14 months old poor little dear I'm worried well if you're worried why don't you call her up you got her number in that little book of yours it's just about 8:00 in San Francisco they'll be up you know I believe I wheel go ahead call her you'll feel [Music] better 3 1 8 g a 5 2 3 6 8 are you sure it isn't too early out there oh no it's it's 11:00 here that means it's 8:00 out there hello Sally Sally this is Mother simple wasn't it she just picked up her telephone and dialed her daughter in San Francisco California in a matter of seconds she is talking with her simple and yet you are seeing the results of many many years of coordinated effort in research engineering and operating experience it's hard for us to realize today that in the early 1880s the telephone was considered a newfangled Contraption boy operators Mann the switchboards in those days and it was an adventure to be able to talk with friends or relatives on the other side of town the telephone at last was filling a deep human need the need of people separated from one another to talk with each other soon alert girl operators replaced the [Music] boys new types of instruments were developed and the telephone grew up with a growing America the demand for telephone service snowballed indeed the use of the telephone became so tremendous that by the 1920s dial service was rapidly being introduced to help handle the increased volume of calls as the calls increased more operators were needed more calls to handle meant more jobs to do and more people to fill those jobs this has been the story all through the development of the telephone for instance in the days when we had little or no dial service the Bell System had 270,000 employees by the time 70% of the telephones were dial there were 600,000 employees more than twice as many [Music] but the remarkable use of the telephone was only part of the story of change in American life as Villages became towns and towns became industrial cities people's interests broadened where those early citizens were thrilled to telephone across town people now wanted to call towns and cities Across the Nation finally they wanted their voices to spam the oceans and they did truly America had grown up all of which brings us back to Anglewood from many of englewood's telephones you could already dial any one of more than 4 million other telephones in the surrounding territory a fine example of modern telephone service and therefore a fine Proving Ground for this new type of LA long-distance service approving ground to answer such questions as will customers like the service do they find it easy to use what improvements can be made this first installation now enables telephone users to dial their own longdistance calls as well as their local calls and calls to nearby communities the equipment that makes this service possible is among the most complex that man has ever devised when you dial a number the equipment obediently receives the information stores it up and remembers it it searches out an electrical pathway for your call choosing the one that is most suitable at a given instant if it finds one pathway blocked it tries another and another another and another if it runs into trouble it automatically reports the trouble and its probable Source parts of the equipment connected with other parts exchange information they do this sometimes by a Touch system such as the blind use in Reading Braille sometimes it's done with a stream of electrons flowing through space sometimes it uses an elaborate system of musical notes played in chords that are heard and interpreted by a mechanical ear but even that's not all of it keeping track of the details of the call is done automatically too when you dial a number holes are punched in a continuous tape representing your telephone number and the number you dial more holes are punched to show the time when you start talking and when you finish talking and hang up if you get a busy signal or the number doesn't answer no charge is made since all this information is in the form of tiny holes in a long piece of paper the meaning of these tiny holes has to be expressed in words and figures this is done by running the tape through several machines which assemble the information translate sort and summarize it figure the length of your call apply the correct rate and you guessed it type your toll statement but for the Anglewood telephone User it's as easy as dialing a local call remember that number Mrs Warren looked up in her personal telephone notebook 318 Garfield 5 2368 the only difference between that and a local number is the three digits at the beginning 318 is the code for the San Francisco area if her daughter had lived in Chicago Mrs Warren would have dialed the code 312 and then the telephone number Cleveland 216 Boston 617 altogether more than 80 numbered areas are planned for the United States and parts of Canada for some time past area numbers like these have been used by telephone operators in dialing longdistance calls when the people in the Anglewood area with one and two party lines were given this service they could dial to 13 of these areas that meant that more than 11 million telephones could be dialed from Englewood when will the 11 million be able to dial Engle would and what about the remaining millions of telephones in the Bell System the answer lies in the future but this much we do know over the years we have seen the results of a successful formula planned research to anticipate the demands of a growing Nation available resources plus the continued efforts of many people this combination has given America steady improvements in telephone service and the story of longdistance dialing points the way to even better telephone service for you tomorrow [Music]