Remember those old PARTY LINES?
By w1z111
@w1z111 (985)
United States
March 17, 2007 5:05pm CST
I'm not talking politics here...I mean those old TELEPHONE PARTY LINES! Back when I was a kid living in rural America, telephone lines had to be "shared" with neighbors. We were on at least a "2-party-line" as far as I remember, and I've read where some folks had to share with up to 20 others!
I can remember times when someone in our house wanted to make a call, and someone else would already be on the line. Normally, you'd just say.."oops! Sorry! I'll try later", once you heard there was someone already using it. That would usually help 'rush them along' a bit, so it worked out ok. But it was always a source of 'mystery', too. One never really knew when someone else might be 'listening-in' on calls. While I don't recall ever having any trouble that way on our line (hmmmmm....maybe we just didn't know?!), I suspect it went on at times.
Anyone else recall any tales about party-lines?
2 people like this
3 responses
@raydene (9871)
• United States
17 Mar 07
Yes I remember them.My sis and I got peeved at the old lady up the road from us because we knew she listened in on our calls.We went to school and asked a friend of ours to call us that night.On the phone we said to the friend that the doctor's daughter(very snobby girl)was pregnant and was going to give it away.About a week late while at the store with my ma bertha(old lady)asked my mom to not tell but she heard that the dr's daughter Milly was pregnant.My ma almost had a heart attact.Bertha didn't know the new dr or his family and didn't know that Milly was only 11 years old.It was a mean thing we did but sometimes 10 year old girls are like that!We admitted and said we were sorry to the dr and his snobby daughter and exposed ole Bertha at the same time.As it happened that Milly and I became good friends later when I discovered that she was shy not a snob.We laughed many times about it.
R
@smints8985 (1594)
• United States
17 Mar 07
haha.. yeah I do remember the party line days, when I was a kid and in the Philippines there are times when you pick up the phone there's already somebody talking ahaha... it was kinda fun, sometimes we would just pick it up and listen to what they are talking about (that is we're really bored and feeling pathetic) ahahha...
@kelly60 (4546)
• United States
17 Mar 07
I remember as a teen always being nervous that someone might be listening in when I talked to my friends. You'r right, you never knew who might be listening. Another problem was that the phone was always busy when you wanted to call home. Someone was always on the line so you could never get through. Of course, if my parents called home and it was me on the phone I could always blame it on one of the neighbors.
