Did you ever have a party line on your phone?
By samsonskola
@samsonskola (3357)
United States
February 6, 2007 7:20pm CST
I remember having a party line on the phone at home. It used to make me so mad. EVERY time i really wanted to make a call, there was someone on there. I will admit i foolishly listened in on conversations from time to time (shhhh)...lol..Did you ever have one? What are your memories of it?
5 people like this
8 responses
@missyd79 (3438)
• United States
12 Feb 07
growing up my parents had one. when the phone rang we always had to wait if it was one long ring it was for us, if it was 2 short rings it was for the other people on our party line. and yes it did suck because everytime we needed to use the phone, they were always on it.
1 person likes this
@samsonskola (3357)
• United States
14 Feb 07
lol...yes, waiting to see if the inoming call was for you seemed like the longest wait!..thank you
1 person likes this
@ElusiveButterfly (45941)
• United States
15 Mar 07
I remember the party lines! My mother had them when we were younger. You had to wait to hear a certain type of ring and only picked it up if it was your ring. I remember my mother saying shush all the time when she was on the phone. She said she wanted to hear if anyone else was on the line before she spoke.
@samsonskola (3357)
• United States
15 Mar 07
I know...they were really more of a pain than anything, unless you wanted to get all the latest gossip!...lol...thanks for the response
@samsonskola (3357)
• United States
8 Feb 07
no i don't think there are any anymore that i know of, the question was had you ever had one.
@LoganzMom (618)
• United States
21 Mar 07
ummm nope sure don't. what is a party line? what is it used for? sounds pretty fun from the comments though lol.
@samsonskola (3357)
• United States
22 Mar 07
a party line was when you had several homes on the same phone line (before everyone had their own unique number). When the phone rang, you were assigned a certain number or pattern of rings to distinguish who the phone was for. And when you wanted to make a call, you had to pick up and listen to make sure no one else was using the line before you could make your call. It was fun, aggravating at times though...lol!
@poppoppop111 (5731)
• Canada
7 Feb 07
We had a party line when i was a kid. however we lived in the country and there wasn't many people in our area and i guess no one else had singed up for a party line cause there was never anyone else on the phone line when we wanted to use it.
1 person likes this
@samsonskola (3357)
• United States
8 Feb 07
lol..you are so lucky that you got to use the phone anytime you wanted to!. I wish ours had been the same way.
@samsonskola (3357)
• United States
7 Feb 07
Oh yeah, I guess there's probably no one who hasn't listened in, is there? It was fun at that point, but not when you really wanted to make a call and there were 2 long winded women on there already!..lol..thank you
@lifeiseasy (2292)
• United States
7 Feb 07
Geezz you are making my tell my age here ...lol I certainly do remember those things ...we would get on the phone when people were on there talking and make cat meows and dogs barking...it was a blast to be mean ...lol
Oh we had to listen in too ,what when have been the use if we didn't do that too ....oh my our neighbors used to get pretty angry with us kids back then ...tehe ...
@samsonskola (3357)
• United States
7 Feb 07
OMG..I'm still laughing thinking about the dog and cat sounds!...I never thought of that (probably a GOOD thing, too!). Thank you so much for the response.
