Two telephone directories for the whole country

Brian Capture

Remember this?

One for Dublin.
The other for everywhere else.

Different times. The days of P & T. Orange vans. Buttons A and B.
Phone numbers like

Fethard 17.

Hopefully some day we'll go back to that era.

mike65

WTF? Back to country with no infrastructure? When you could lift the reciever and listen to some elses call?

Mike.

Wishbone Ash

mike65 wrote: »

WTF? Back to country with no infrastructure? When you could lift the reciever and listen to some elses call?

Mike.

...............and wait 2 years for a landline (unless you 'knew' someone and might only have to wait 1 year)! :eek:

TheDriver

Isn't it lucky we are not in a country like this anymore.............................

Firetrap

</sarcasm>

Oh yeah, we had to wait for ages to get a telephone into our house. Back then, they looked soooo sophisticated on American TV shows like Dallas because they had phones with buttons on them rather than naff dially ones.

When my aunt got her phone, the exchange she was attached to still hadn't gone digital so we'd have to ring up the operator. Her phone was a mad lookin' yoke with no dial and a crank handle. We did experience the odd crossed line as well. What a shame we don't get those anymore.

kelle

I had a weird hobby whjen I was young. I'd be watching a quiz show and would take note of the names of the contestants and where they were from, then look them up in the directory to see what their telephone no. was. I didn't go as far as ringing them or anything, so I don't know why I did this. Maybe it's the retro equivalent of Bebo perving!
That hobby ended for me when the we got regional directories.

Blisterman

I don't understand, why they don't just make every landline in ireland, the same area code, with a 7 digit number.
I mean, with a 7 digit number, you have ~8,000,000 combinations of numbers.

Hotblack Desiato

Wishbone Ash wrote: »

...............and wait 2 years for a landline

2 years - you were lucky!
10 years was not uncommon in parts of Dublin in the 1970s/80s. Neighbours used to come to our house to make calls as we had one of the handful of phones on the road (out of 300 houses) and leave 20p beside the phone!
It was the mid-80s before the exchange was upgraded and they could put more lines in, then all of a sudden everyone on the waiting list got one. If there were no lines available in the area, it didn't matter how many TDs you had writing begging letters on your behalf!

L1011

Blisterman wrote: »

I don't understand, why they don't just make every landline in ireland, the same area code, with a 7 digit number.
I mean, with a 7 digit number, you have ~8,000,000 combinations of numbers.

Because we ran out of mobile numbers doing this (previously your 08x xxxxxxx number was reserved across all 08x codes). There are probably 8 million landlines *already*, when you considering offices, fax lines, ISDN lines (2 numbers for each), etc.

The North has one area code but uses 8 digit numbers.

I can just about remember the exchange where my family are originally from going digital, directly from being wind-up, talk to operator... most areas had an automatic analogue one in between. Grandfathers phone number used to be Arranmore 49.

The house I'm in now got its original phone line because someone else nearby didn't pay their bills due to being unemployed in the mid 80s and got cut off. We got calls from their bank for ages and ages afterwards as TE issued the same phone number! Were only waiting a few months, mind.

bitemybanger

Wht dont China have any phone books???
Because theres so many Wing and Wongs that they might wing the wong number. Get it.. wing the wong numbers:D:D:D:rolleyes:;)

Raven_k42

...anyone remember with the old A/B phones...you could "tap" all the numbers except 0, 1 and 9 ??. Trying to remember if it actually worked for me...maybe just an urban myth !.

Another one I'd hear lots...call a number and if it was engaged (or if you had a partner who had called it already it would be engaged for sure) ...dial the last number again...then you had an outgoing line on that number !!. I know people who used to call their friends/relations in the US with this method.

The good old days !!.

K

Jimbo

bitemybanger wrote: »

Wht dont China have any phone books???
Because theres so many Wing and Wongs that they might wing the wong number. Get it.. wing the wong numbers:D:D:rolleyes:;)

Yea thats a god one. I almost didnt get it, thankfully you repeated it

Thomas_S_Hunterson

Raven_k42 wrote: »

...anyone remember with the old A/B phones...you could "tap" all the numbers except 0, 1 and 9 ??. Trying to remember if it actually worked for me...maybe just an urban myth !.

Another one I'd hear lots...call a number and if it was engaged (or if you had a partner who had called it already it would be engaged for sure) ...dial the last number again...then you had an outgoing line on that number !!. I know people who used to call their friends/relations in the US with this method.

The good old days !!.

K

On the subject of that, were there every any Blue Box-ers. It's a bit before my time, but I've read up quite a bit on the old 2600Hz tricks in the states.

I presume they would have worked here at some stage as well, or possibly even still work????

L1011

They don't still work.

They *might* have worked in (generally affluent) urban areas that were fitted with more modern automatic exchanges in the 70s, but as Telecom Eireann went from a state of having an archaic network (Stroweger switches, manual switchboads) to a digital one very quickly there weren't huge areas covered with these...

Wishbone Ash

bitemybanger wrote: »

Wht dont China have any phone books???
Because theres so many Wing and Wongs that they might wing the wong number. Get it.. wing the wong numbers:D:D:D:rolleyes:;)

There used to be a "Wongnumba" in one of the UK directories... ...the mind boggles!

Sully

I remember if you dialed "1997", the phone would ring when you hung up.

Dont think they do it anymore

ciaran76

Sully wrote: »

I remember if you dialed "1997", the phone would ring when you hung up.

Dont think they do it anymore

It used to be 171 or 1771 at our local public telephone. We would wait to see if someone would be walking down the street and dial the no. real quickly hang up and hide and watch to see if they picked up.

It was funny back then !:o:p;)

Antenna

Brian Capture wrote: »

One for Dublin.
The other for everywhere else.

see my attached picture! retrieved from attic at home

Its the "everywhere else", or 'Part 2' (all outside the 01 area) Telecom Eireann phonebook for 1985. I think it was the last year of that arrangement (only 2 phonebooks for the whole country) considering this book was held on to!

Wishbone Ash

Antenna wrote: »

see my attached picture! retrieved from attic at home

Its the "everywhere else", or 'Part 2' (all outside the 01 area) Telecom Eireann phonebook for 1985. I think it was the last year of that arrangement (only 2 phonebooks for the whole country) considering this book was held on to!

Nice one Antenna.

I used to have the 1942 Irish telephone directory but it seems to have disappeared.

It was for the whole country and about the thickness of a typical womens' glossy magazine.