Schematics

For 1960's Western Electric manual and rotary dial
Pay Phone schematics,
click here for figure 1 and here for figure 24.

Western Electric 236G coin (pay) phone info (courtesy of Dennis Owens): Page 1 and Page 2.

Phone Booth Advertisements

Phone Booth History Advertisement Click to enlarge (courtesy of Kermit Simon) Click HERE to see an unusual phone booth made out of concrete!

Click HERE to see an old advertisement by the Bell System for payphones. Scan of phone booth advertisement

And then came the breakup of the Bell System and anyone could own a payphone.  Here is an advertisement by AT&T for today's modern payphone. Click on image above to enlarge

Avaya Plant Readies To Close

SHREVEPORT, La. (AP) -- The plant that once built the majority of U.S. pay telephones will close on Sept. 30, putting 900 workers out of jobs, the plant's new owner, Avaya Inc. (NYSE:AV - news), said Tuesday.

The plant is 35 years old and had been operated by Lucent Technologies, AT&T's consumer products division and Western Electric, which used the plant to build pay phones. At one time, the plant had as many as 3,000 employees.

Avaya, based in Basking Ridge, N.J., took over the plant in October, when it was spun off from Lucent, and had been manufacturing small business communication systems there.

The closure was part of a deal under which Avaya agreed to send most manufacturing of its communications systems as well as some software to Toronto-based Celestica Inc. (NYSE:CLS - news) in a transaction valued at $4 billion over five years.

"This is an economic decision for the company, a very difficult one," said Avaya spokesman Kevin Stewart. "We know it's a very difficult time for our employees."

About 700 of the workers are unionized and are eligible for immediate retirement, the company said. Workers also can apply for openings at other Avaya, Lucent and Celestica facilities, the company said.

Avaya's deal with Celestica is expected to close during the third quarter of 2001.

As call for pay phones lessens,
BellSouth to cash in its stake

It is difficult to find information on pay telephones or coin phones as they use to be called. However, I found an excellent and interesting historical summary about the history of pay phones on AT&T's web site. The text from the  AT&T web page is shown below.

For photos of pay phones from around the world,
go to this neat web site:
The Pay Phone Project.

Photos of Bob's Antique Telephones
Phone: 1-260-351-4792
E-mail: [email protected]

"HIGHLIGHTS IN PAY PHONE HISTORY"

From a link on the AT&T web site http://www.att.com/press/1091/911002.csa.html

"Pay telephone stations preceded the invention of the pay phone and existed as early as 1878. These stations were supervised by telephone company attendants or agents (such as an employee in a hotel where a station might be located) who collected the money due after people made their calls. Some pay stations utilized a fail-safe collection method: After making the connections for customers, attendants would lock them in booths so they couldn't leave without paying.

In 1889, the first public coin telephone was installed by inventor William Gray at a bank in Hartford, Conn. It was a "postpay" machine (coins were deposited after the call was placed). Gray's previous claim to fame was inventing the inflatable chest protector for baseball.

In 1898, the Western Electric No. 5 Coin Collector, the first automatic "prepay" station, went into use in Chicago. The depositing of coins before placing a call would gradually become the norm in pay phones until the introduction of "dial tone first" service in 1966.

By 1902, there were 81,000 pay telephones in the United States.

In 1905, the first outdoor Bell System coin telephone was installed on a Cincinnati street. It wasn't an instant hit; people apparently were reluctant to make private calls on a public thoroughfare. (Moose were not as shy when they first encountered outdoor pay phones. When Bell Laboratories designed a new glass and aluminum outdoor telephone booth in the 1950s, it was a great advancement over the wooden outdoor booths that had been in use for a number of years. And yet several booths ordered by the U.S. National Park Service were found mysteriously broken and battered. Park rangers soon knew the answer, though: It was mating season for moose. Amorous--but territorial--bulls were charging the booths whenever they saw their reflections in the glass.)

In 1910, Western Electric and Gray Telephone Pay Station Co. signed an agreement for Gray to manufacture coin collectors for the Bell System using both Gray and Western Electric patents.

The result of that agreement, the 50A coin collector, went into production in 1911. By the end of 1912, 25,000 of these coin telephones had been ordered for New York City alone. The 50A model had three coin slots--for nickels, dimes and quarters --and was a "prepay" machine. The basic design, though often modified, was so practical and reliable it remained in production until 1964. In 1965, Western Electric introduced the 50A's successor. Among other things, it had a single coin slot instead of three, and electronic signalling of coins deposited replaced mechanical bells.

The booths that house pay phones have undergone more design changes than the phones themselves. At the turn of the century, indoor booths were constructed of durable hardwood, such as mahogany, with comfort and privacy in mind, and exhibited detailed craftsmanship. They were often carpeted. The "original" telephone booth is credited to Thomas Watson, the man who helped Alexander Graham Bell invent the telephone. Watson's "booth" was made by draping blankets over the furniture in his room and crawling underneath to conduct early telephone experiments. One story says Watson, in order to hear, was insulating himself from street noises. Another story is that his landlady ordered Watson to be quieter; his shouting, albeit for the sake of science, was disturbing other boarders. In 1883 Watson designed a real booth. It was built of expensive wood, had a domed top with a ventilator, windows with screens, and a desk with pen and ink. Over the years, telephone booths have reflected their surroundings as well as the times. There have been phone booths resembling cable cars in San Francisco, and others resembling pagodas in New York City's Chinatown district. In the 1960s, as American architects designed glass-wall office buildings, wooden phone booths looked out of place in lobbies. Bell Laboratories designed an indoor glass and metal phone booth to better fit newer surroundings. Not all of the designs for phone booths have reached the market. An experimental "hands-free" booth in 1972 featured a microphone in front of the caller and a loudspeaker in the booth's ceiling. Observers noted that people readily tried the new arrangement but that, conditioned to speaking in the direction another voice is coming from, they were all shouting into the ceiling.

In 1950, the first coin telephone mobile train service was established on the Pennsylvania Railroad between New York and Washington.

"Calling from your car" was first tested in Mobile Ala., and Chicago in 1957. Drive-up pay telephones proved popular and are still in use today.

In 1960, the Bell System installed its one millionth pay telephone.

In 1964, when the U.S. Treasury Department decided to change the metallic composition of U.S. coins, it consulted with Bell Laboratories to ensure the new coins would still function properly in pay phones.

"Dial tone first" service was introduced in 1966 in Hartford, Conn. This essentially turned coin phones into emergency call stations because such calls could be made without first depositing coins.

In 1977, "automatic coin telephone service" was introduced in Phoenix, Ariz. This allowed most pay telephone calls, including long-distance, to be made without operator assistance. A computer-controlled synthesized voice gave customers the necessary instructions.

AT&T introduced "Charge-a-Call," a "coinless" pay phone, in 1978 (and the term "pay phone" began to replace "coin phone").

In 1984, AT&T introduced the AT&T Card Caller, which featured a video screen with dialing instructions and allowed customers to charge calls by inserting an AT&T Calling Card. The Card Caller also was the first of AT&T's public phones to feature a "loud" button, which allows callers to control the listening volume. It helps the hearing-impaired as well as those having a hard time hearing because of environmental noise.

In 1990, AT&T introduced the AT&T Public Phone 1000, which features a data port for laptop computer and portable fax use, speed dialing for select AT&T services and travelers assistance. This tabletop phone was designed primarily for airline lounges and hotels.

The latest advance in pay phone technology is the AT&T Public Phone 2000. Introduced in the fall of 1991, the Public Phone 2000 has a built-in keyboard, a data port and a nine-inch color monitor. Besides offering all the traditional voice services, it enables travelers to use an array of services never before available from a pay phone. Public Phone 2000 users can access electronic mail and online databases, connect a portable fax machine or computer, obtain language translation services, speed-dial travel assistance services and even get weather forecasts."

Copyright © 1997 AT&T. All rights reserved.

Links:

Pay Phone Directory

PayPhone Project
 

Miscellaneous:

Man Separated from Payphone at Hospital

A Western Electric 3-slotter pay phone (on wall between restroom doors)
was used in Al's Diner on the TV show "Happy Days"

The 1950's look: A teenage girl standing next to a
Western Electric pay telephone in the "Happy Days" TV show!

Guess who this famous person is?  Hint:  "It's A Wonderful Life".

Could these guys be the Beatles in those phone booths?
 

And just some ordinary people with payphones:

Modern day girl on modern payphone using calling card instead of coins.

April 2002 - Payphone at Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park near where I live.

A close-up front view of this payphone can be viewed by clicking HERE.
Note BellSouth logo on left side of booth partition and on vault door.
Booth is painted "forest green" to make it blend in with the natural environment of the park.
The phone number of this payphone is 770-428-9258 in the USA.
 

One year later, April 2003 UPDATE!!

Well, as expected, BellSouth is serious about getting out of the payphone business. I went back to this location April of 2003 and the phone was gone!
See updated photo below:

These phone booths are located at the BP gasoline station at the intersection of Cobb Parkway (Hwy. 41) and Bells Ferry Road in Marietta, Georgia, USA which is in BellSouth's service area. However, the phone itself has a  Cincinnati Bell identification card  but the phone book's protective cover (seen hanging down from the phone booth in photo above) says BellSouth and there is no company name or logo on the top part of the phone booth where you would normally find some sort of logo and name.  There is no telling what phone company this unidentified girl was using when she placed her call.

Just a few steps away from the phone booths at the BP station shown above is a real BellSouth phone booth at the McDonald's restaurant.  It is in need of repair at seen in the photo below but it is interesting that McDonald's has their name and logo on the sides of the booth.

Clicking on the sign on the top of the pole, or the middle of the booth, or the
top of the booth in the photo above will enlarge those areas for better viewing.

Photo taken by and sent to by anonymous donor.

"Bell System" Phone Booths spotted
at Yellowstone National Park!

View outside the "General Store"	Photo #1 of Phone Booths
Photo #2 of Phone Booths	Close-up photo of Bell System logo on lighted sign of phone booth

Click on images above to view full-size

You'll find lots of payphone photos from around the world at:
http://www.payphone-project.com/payphones/photos/