How Phones Made the World Your Office, Like It or Not

The 1983 picture of the 'too important to miss a call or step outside' Doubleday editor talking on a cordless phone while sitting at a table with other diners in a public restaurant, shows conduct that is as inconsiderate and rude now as it was then.

The only thing about this article that bothers me is that in discussing Martin Cooper's historic call to Bell Laboratories it leaves out a rather crucial piece of enabling technology: the cell tower! Presumably there was only one of those, too, and, like the phone itself, I'd guess it was also a hand-assembled prototype.

A bit of nit-picking: I wish you’d label each photograph with its date, not just (inconsistently) note it in the text. After all, these reports do have to do with history and although, for me, history is absolutely not reducible to dates, it does involve contextualizing sequentiality. Noting the sequence of years helps us to better understand the development of the events represented in the photographs.

So, did anyone call that payphone in Penn Station? The number was strangely visible.

In 1968, I began a career in telephony with Ohio Bell. It started out as summer and holiday employment rotating through various first line jobs (installer/repairman, central office tech, line assigner, field I/R foreman). The goal was to entice college degreed people into company careers. After graduating college in 1972, I accepted a first level management position while waiting to be drafted, as the Bell System subscribed to the GI Bill of Rights thus guaranteeing a job if I survived Vietnam. I did not get drafted (Nixon stopped the draft 6 numbers short of mine). I continued my employment moving through other assignments until leaving 1 year after Divestiture (1984). I stayed in telephony as an independent consultant until retirement, all the while marveling at the technological advancements that never made the headlines like the cellphone. What I marveled at even more was the commitment to service and community exemplified by the people of the Bell System, GTE, United Telephone and all the other telephone systems. It was family as much as it was a job. I am not sure it is that way today, but I am hopeful, for you see, it isn’t the technology itself, but the incredible people behind it!

What a great story! AND I love anything that uses your photo archives! My grandmother was alive when the telephone was introduced. She was quite a woman! She had studied Economics at Swarthmore College and bought stock in what became A,T, and T! Which helped put many of her descendants through college. Thanks so much for your hard work. It was much appreciated! Jinny

Thanks for this fun article, and for letting us know about Mr. Cooper. I love how he razzed his rival, and the fact that at the age of 90 he remains optimistic that despite the current state of affairs humanity will figure out this new tool. My kind of guy!

While being retired I drive a limo a few times a week usually to and from the NYC area airports. It's unusual for a client to just sit and enjoy the ride. Business people decry the days when they looked forward to being in a car where they couldn't be reached. A few days ago I picked up a newly wed couple just back from their honeymoon in Italy. The 2 hr ride saw them texting friends and not a single word as they sat on opposite sides of the car.

The first cell phone call using actual cellular infrastructure available to the subject and not dedicated for a single call was made in Chicago in 1983 by Mr. Cooper again. This is, of course the NY Times, which means a NYC-centric point-of-view, but in the technology world the 1983 call in Chicago to Motorola's HQ in suburban Schaumburg is truly the world's first cell call. That fall Chicago had the first infrastructure for anyone to make a commercial cellular phone call using AMPS or Advanced Mobile Phone Service. It was not for a couple of years that NYC had similar service quickly migrating to TDMA or Time Division Multiple Access. This is really the story, not the 1973 using only a single dedicated frequency. And supposedly even this test re-created multiple cellular calls from one section of Motorola's campus to another.

I am the proud non-owner of a mobile. Never had one, and won't unless it is practical. They are alienation devices.

Do Not Pick Up the Telephone by Ted Hughes https://choristerathome.com/2017/12/21/do-not-pick-up-the-telephone/ That'll cure your desire for communication.

As a child of the 50's, I clearly remember when 'The Princess' phone arrived. I remember when the old rotary-phone went the way of the dinosaur and push-button features flooded the demimonde. Before phone-answer-machines were available; Girls and Boys, there was a time when someone decided to call-you and your phone would ring loudly endlessly, or until the caller finally gave up. I remember reading 'Dear Abby' one day and someone asked her what she should do? Her friends and relatives all called every day and once she'd spoken with them all she didn't have to to do the laundry, care for her pets, go shopping and get dinner on the table in time for her hard-working husband each night. Abby's answer was succinct: "Don't Pick-Up. Just because someone decides they want to interrupt your day to gossip; it doesn't mean that you have to pick the phone-up and answer. Unplug your phone. There is no 'social' rule or federal-law that requires you to answer the phone." I took Abby's advice and while I am working throughout the day; I simply do not answer. And, inevitably, when one of my clients finally does receive a return-phonecall from me, I respond to their complaint by asking them,"What do you prefer: that I solve the problem you've hired me to solve; or should I cut my working-days in half taking 'immediate' phone calls and texts that don't just cause an interruption, but 9 times out of 10 phone calls are not 'emergencies'?"

To see how firmly wedded people can be to their 'phones', watch the tv show Live PD. You'll see cops struggling to arrest people who refuse to let go of their phones. The handcuffs finally go on, and you'll see the culprit still gripping the phone for dear life. The cop eventually relieves them of the phone and tosses it on top of the car, and as the person is dragged off they are screaming "I NEED MY PHONE, GIVE ME MY PHONE!"

My mother, a former Marine Corps telephone operator who handled lines to and from the Pentagon told me the following when we got our first "private" phone line. "There is no such thing as a private line", she said, "the government listens to all phone calls." When the CEO of Android told Congress that my phone reports to him 14 times per minute with my location including what floor of a building I am on, that was it. My phone is off almost all of the time. If it is on, not only do I get tracked but I get daily robocalls in Mandarin. I get Amber Alerts from two states away. I get late night people buzzing the gate with the wrong address or they are just trying to scam their way in - "I forgot my key, can you let me in?". I have never used my phone as a computer because texting is so slow compared to typing email and the screen is so tiny that I would rather wait till I get in front of my big monitor at home to try and read anything. If I can figure out how to let visitors into the apartment without a phone, I think I will get rid of it all together. I'm just paying a monthly bill so corporations can spam me all day. Call my doctor? Dear God, it takes so long to get through that I can literally ride my bike several miles to his office quicker than get a real person. With my last dating profile I put in large letters NO ONE UNDER 30! Why? They can't put their phone down long enough to get their shoes off. Cell phones - meh!

As a retired professor I can see the advantages of mobile phones, of connecting people across great distances, linking groups of people who would otherwise be isolated, and sharing information. But mostly what I see among young people is an addiction to their devices, a breakdown in verbal communication, couples on dates where each is buried in their phone. I see this with my children and grandchildren - isolation and not promised communication. Not to mention an increase in neck, shoulder, and back problems from looking down all day, and possible cancer risks from the phones themselves and the wireless towers. Selfies, people at parties dancing by themselves while looking at themselves on their phones. Breaks my heart.

When I was little, my mother, and others, enforced on me the politeness of getting out of other people's way; giving way to those older than myself generally. Now I am that older person, likely much older and much more broken, and yet now, thanks to modern phones, I still have to step out of people's way, constantly, and most often for kids. I was at Pearl Harbor on Sunday and the number of people paying no attention whatsoever to their surroundings is stunning in it's priceless ignorance and egomaniacal in its utter selfishness just to post another Instagram picture immediately, and then watch the likes come in. Is this really life? I never wanted to work in an office, but now I'm forced to live in one wherever I go; listening to every inane conversation that humans can dream up. Now looking for 200 acres of solitude in the mountains to get away from this insanity.

In the 70's I regularly traveled to Hong Kong in late November. While there, I not only could not watch The Game live, but the results typically weren't published in the International Edition of the South China Morning Post. Of course, I could have called home from my hotel at $25/minute, but who had that kind of money? So, I figured out I could call the local desk of the Associated Press, and the person who answered would be kind enough to at least read me the score off the teletype. Thanks to Mr. Cooper and many other communications technologists like him, this past November en route from Frankfurt to Singapore on Lufthansa, I was able to stream The Game live to my laptop. OSU 62, UM 39. Is this a great country, or what?

The pic from the "busiest pay phone in New York City" at Penn station reminded me of the grim feeling I would get when locating a pay phone to make an important call only to find it greasy and disgusting, leaving you with a choice to either use it or go on the hunt for another phone. Who regrets the demise of the pay phone? Not me.

Great story !!!! Brought back lots of good memories, my dad Stan Zidtowecki worked for New Jersey Bell back in the 1960s and worked in Florida for ATT. Over 30 years of service. I remember him teaching me how to tone out bundles of 400 wires and taught me how to use repair handset, which you used to clip on wires outside someone house and you could call the operator to test the line. I remember when he brought home the briefcase telephone and I thought he was James Bond..... phone company employees everywhere... thanks for your service and keeping up connected !!!!!!

Steve Jobs the genius, I’m so sick of hearing this. All he did was create a toy for adults. I was well into my thirties before cell phones became so common, I don’t remember feeling out of touch not being able to see what someone’s cat is doing.

When I was in kindergarten or first grade, we were taught how to make a phone call. 1) dial the number on the phone attached to the wall or on a table. 2) allow the phone to ring ten times before hanging up because it can take a while for someone to reach it. 3) Always be polite, "May I speak with...?" And my mother would have added, "Don't twist the cord!" The technology may be long gone but the lesson will stay with me forever.

We got our first 'suitcase cell phone' to take on our pontoon boat, out on the lake. IF we ran into trouble, we could call the marine equivalent of AAA, and get help. We used it several times. It was worth it!

Email my son or my grandson? Phone my son or my grandson? NEVER. Text my son or my grandson he responds within the hour. If you have grandchildren you MUST have a smart phone and learn to text if you want to communicate. The 'phone' part of a smart phone is mostly obsolete for people under 30, except perhaps for business communications?

AND...as I write, "landline" telephone companies totter on Bankruptcy. Verizon "dumped" their copper landlines and a random collection of FiOS systems in over a dozen states several years ago. What happened? Frontier (mis)Communications loaded up on debt and bought many of them. Frontier is tottering on bankruptcy (Google it) and just dumped everything in the Pacific Northwest on a Hedge Fund at fire sale prices. Consumers in WV and across the country took Frontier to court (and won) for egregious collapses in service. Here in California we consider it a daily victory to get a dial tone and complete a long distance call. Customer service? You've got to be kidding! What else? Hawaiian Telecom bought some VZ copper, and quickly went belly-up. Fairpoint bought lots in of copper in New England and also went bankrupt. And the FCC seems competely incapable, perhaps even more so that the TelCos, to stop the billions of RoboCalls made to consumers every month. "Number spoofing" seems "too hard" for anyone to figure out. Let's open our hymnals to HYMN No. 1: "HAIL TECHNOLOGY!! Technology Will Set Us Free!" Could the organist get off his cell phone and get us all ready to sing?

Noting the comments to the photo “Female domination of the field of operator assistance started with Emma Nutt”: Around 1972 I was a male night school law student in Manhattan working in the construction industry in the northern suburbs. Between the commute, my studies and the physical work I knew I needed a different day job. I heard about operator assistance jobs opening at AT&T Long Lines in White Plains, NY. Long Lines there handled international phone calls between US and Europe/India/Pakistan. At the time you couldn’t just dial up someone in London from your home or office phone. You needed the International Operator. The operator positions then were traditionally reserved for black females. Due to settlement of a reverse discrimination lawsuit, AT&T needed to make the position more diverse, i.e., young white males. In other words: Me. As an incentive for new recruits to take the position AT&T offered substantial “tuition reimbursement”. I took the job, got trained and AT&T reimbursed me for a large part of my tuition for 4 semesters until I took a job in the legal field. Even though AT&T had to rework the employee locker room, the job was pretty cool!

I always enjoyed the scene where Gordon Gekko gets out of prison, and amongst the items returned to him is this giant cell phone, which has become obsolete during his time in prison. Got a good laugh from the audience when I saw it in a theater. The clip on YouTube follows: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LvyDYhBiXLw

I got my first cell phone (a car phone) circa 1990, just like the one in the article's picture of the same year. A handset with cord mounted on the center console, a big box in the trunk and an antenna on the roof. It was from GTE Mobile Net, now Verizon, and I've been a customer ever since. I've had lots of different phones over these past 30-years, but became a Blackberry die-hard and still use one (with real keys). I dumped the land-line in 2000 and never looked back. They are a "blessing and a curse," but as Mr. Cooper noted, they do have an off switch. At night I sleep peacefully because mine is off and charging and in a closet.

One of the ways that telephones wowed folks some 100 years ago was the novelty of talking to someone IN A DIFFERENT TIME ZONE! This was probably the first time people asked each other, "What time is it where you are?"

A recent experience rafting the Colorado River through Grand Canyon proved to me the pervasive addiction with which today's smartphones affect people. After 3 full weeks on the river with no phone service available (we did carry a satellite phone for emergencies as required by the national park; never used); as soon as my 2 compatriots were just halfway back to the rim, service was again available. Halleleujah! Thank you, Lord! They immediately buried their noses in their screens and kept them there for the entire 3+ hours back to Flagstaff. I don't have a smartphone or even a burner cell myself (I don't like the concept of being so available), but their responses to the lack of phone service while on the river highlighted how ugly our dependance on these phones has become. One might wonder if they really appreciated their time among the wondrous world of Grand canyon's inner-canyon. I found it all very depressing.

No more phone booths in the neighborhoods. Where does Superman change into his super duds? The problem these days is that you can no longer be without a cell phone on your person for connecting with your friends, family, job, and emergencies.

Also how the phone made the office your 24/7 world. At a Yale University Passover seder, the most commonly sought current day freedom among students was from their phones.

Cell phones are definitely a mixed bag, a blessing and a curse. You can work from anywhere, anytime...and often you do, so it tips the work life balance to one side. Still, on the whole, I think humanity can manage it, if we reemphasize education and reading more widely among the masses. Right now I think tech has distracted far too many away from basic learning and critical thinking skills.

Steve Jobs best product was the iPod not the iPhone. The iPod paved the way for everything Apple created after that.

Good Lord, I *do* feel old. Many (thankfully not quite all) of these things I remember having or doing. It's been a real journey watching generation after generation of phones, networking, storage, and computer technologies roll past and change our lives - change, but not always improve. Just like the first computer I used - a System 360/20 with 32 KB of CORE memory I now complain that my phone has only 4 GB of main memory, and 256 GB of storage. And I had one of those Motorola Phones that you carried around in a small satchel - awkward, but I loved knowing my daughter could call if there were ever an emergency late at night. I'm waiting to see what the next couple of generations will look like - that's probably another year or so...

My parents farm house phone was a party line. Our ring was one long ring. There were 8 people on our 4- number dialing line. My Dad used to make a bowl of popcorn and listen in sometimes. If he was talking to his family he’d switch to German if he thought someone else was listening. I remember when I met my husband in ‘84 I was so impressed he had an antenna phone in the kitchen. It was big, clunky hand-held rather like the one used in the Seinfeld show. When I was selling real estate in 1992 a car phone became the big thing to have. I didn’t do this because the few who did couldn’t take it inside an open house - they rarely used it in their car. Another year or two I had my first cell phone. Around 1992 my long-haul trucker husband bought a bag-phone at an AT&T stand at - get this - the Indiana State Fair. No longer did he have to stand in line at truck stops waiting for a pay phone. We still made dates to talk but it was so much easier to get ahold of him - not yet like today though. Later that year he took the bag phone to deer camp with his family. One night they drove to the highest point in camp and I talked to everyone on this new spankin’ bag phone. What a hoot! Sears Roebuck was the first company that had phones on desks - around 1925. People worried that productivity would drop because workers would be on the phone. I now have an iPhone XR. Best phone I ever had. But then they all are, aren’t they?

What is with the suit coat on Mr Mitchell? It appears that it is buttoned wrong or lopsided. Guess he was distracted by his phone.

I've had all kinds of mobile phones. I didn't get an iPhone until Motorola stopped supporting my Droid X. I still have all these old phones, and some actually still work. I loved my Razor, wow. Now I have an iPhone X, and really like it. But I hardly ever use it as a phone. Oh, the call quality is essentially perfect, but phone calls aren't how I communicate anymore. Texts are. I hardly even email anymore. I wonder how many people actually use their smart phones as phones these days. When I walk down the street, everyone has their nose buried in their phone. Not calling, but reading. What interesting and powerful devices these phones are. But they're changing social interactions in ways we couldn't have imagined a decade ago. And, I think, not for the better, although I freak if I go out and have forgotten to take my iPhone with me.

Lost in all this concern about being reachable anywhere is the concern about being reachable from anywhere. While phone-posturing used to be the province of the moneyed classes ("Hey son, I'm calling from a private plane over London!" - true story), the boastful and needy can now foist themselves on their luckless relatives and subordinates from the taxi, the beach, the liquor lounge, and even the sanitary facilities. And we all get to listen in!

I'm reminded of Tony Roberts' character in "Play It Again, Sam," the business exec who would leave his secretary a string of phone numbers where he could be reached at various points of the day. I'm also reminded of a talk on my university campus given by a member of the original Star Trek production team, whose name I forget. Cell phones were just becoming more common but not yet widespread, and he warned us, "Beware of any little box that, nowhere you go in the world, allows people to find you and bother you."

The real genius was Steve Jobs- he knew that it was not just a phone, but a mobile personal computer, which has all the apps and capabilities (and more) of a PC (think camera, album, appointment book, etc). And he pushed his idea to control with your fingers, not a keyboard (like Blackberry insisted) or a stylus (like Microsoft wanted). A true visionary and genius. We miss him.