Off Topic — HabitableZone

Off Topic » in reply to Time shifting and ONE PHONE in HOUSE!!!!!!

Try party lines!
Larry J — (archived)

Perhaps I'm dating myself, but my family lived in a rural area when we got our first phone. It was a 4 party line, meaning 4 homes shared the same line. Each home got a distinctive ring so you'd know when to pick up. You quickly learned to listen for the dial tone before dialing (yes, DAILING! No push button phones!) because someone else might be using the line. Any one of the parties could listen in on any phone conversation. There was no such thing as privacy. Some people had 8 party lines. A few had 2 party lines. Very few people could afford private lines.

Other things I remember from those years:

No color TV. The B&W TVs had mechanical tuners that were a pain to keep adjusted. The TVs and most other electronic products had vacuum tubes. Also, the TV (only 1 in the house) had only 4 channels at best.
No VCRs, CDs, DVDs, or cable.
No microwave ovens.
No cell phones (the only mobile "car phones" were very expensive).
No digital watches.
No GPS, no IPod, no Walkman, or other personal electronic devices other than transistor radios. AM radio was the only thing most people had.
No personal computers (they were invented the year I graduated high school)
No calculators. They became affordable my junior year of high school. I took sophmore chemistry using a slide rule. I still have it (and still know how to use it).
Airline travel was something most people couldn't afford.

About the only foreign cars we saw back then were VW Beetles, a very few Mercedes & BMWs (there were a lot of Germans in our area), and a few British sports cars. No Toyotas. No Hondas. No Masdas.

I'm also old enough (48) to remember when "Made in Japan" meant "junk."

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