pcf@galadriel.british-telecom.co.uk (Pete French) (09/14/89)
>[Moderator's Note: Well Larry, your history is right on the mark. Many >people are amazed to find out that Automatic Electric -- and not Bell >-- 'invented' the dial phone system. And an old story has it that the >inventor did so because he was paranoid about the operators diverting >profitable business calls from him to one of his competitors. Any >truth to that? PT] Oh no - time to dig up this one again. Almon Strowger was a Kansas City undertaker. In those days calls were connected by hand by an operator. The operator was the sister (or was it cousin) of a rival undertaker and she was surruptisiously diverting calls for Strowger to him. Mr Strowger was, understandably, a bit irritated by this and so set about devising an automatic exchange to get round this problem. This is what is commonly known as a "Strowger" exchange - although I think the Americans call it "SxS" for some reason. When I joined British Telecom this is one of the first stories we were told about the history of telephones. It was quite interesting at the time - since then the story has been told at almost every introduction to something that I have been to. Just about every BT student must know it off by heart by now. If any of you get a chance to go in a Strowger exchange then do so - they are far more interesting than any of the other types - simply because they move and do things. They are a bit loud though - you need ear-defenders in some of the larger ones. But it is quite facinating to atch the uni-selectors and two-motion selectors do their stuff. At one point in out training we were allowed to play with a simple one ( uni-selector->dual-motion slector->end selector) and you could dial and wwatch the progress of the call as you did so. Another interesting this is to stand in front of the "wall" of meters and listened to all that clicking ("Those clicks are paying your wages sonny") They are always clicking - but no matter how hard you try the ones you are looking at are never the ones that move. I also find it interesting that nobody has designed an electronic version of Strowger. Mechanical parts wera out and surely a solid-state replacement for each of the units would be very cheap and more reliable. There are still a lot left in operation. -Pete French. | British Telecom Research Labs. | "The carefree days are distant now, Martlesham Heath, East Anglia. | I wear my memories like a shroud..." All my own thoughts (of course) | -SIOUXSIE