Major Telephone Developments

November 17, 2008

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Profile America — Monday, November 17th. We still use the word “dial” to refer to the act of calling someone’s phone number — even though several generations have never used a rotary dial phone, or maybe even seen one, except in the movies. Push-button, or touch-tone, phones made their debut this week in 1963. At the time, the service cost extra — and was only available in two cities in Pennsylvania. But it didn’t take long for the increased speed of placing calls on the new phones to make them popular. At the time, 81 percent of U.S. homes had telephones. Today, that figure is 92 percent. The average household pays just over $24.50 a month for local service. Across the country, we make more than a billion local calls every day. You can find these and more facts about America from the U.S. Census Bureau online at <www.census.gov>.

Sources: Chase's Calendar of Events 2008, p. 559
Famous First Facts, 7726
Historical Statistics of the United States: Colonial Times to 1970, p. 783
Statistical Abstract of the United States 2008, t. 1099, 1119
http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2008edition.html