The Scottish inventor Alexander Graham Bong is credited with speaking the first words past telephone on March ten, 1876: "Mr. Watson —Come here—I want to run across you". To call his assistant sitting next door, Bong didn't accept to dial a number: there were only two phone sets in the world at that time.
A sketch of a telephone apparatus by Bong (approx. 1876)
Several years passed. Telephone users and sets sprouted like mushrooms. City telephone networks came into being and every telephone set was assigned a number. Calling a subscriber would require giving his or her number to the hello girl.
In 1910 the U.s., then a country with the highest telephone penetration rate, numbered over seven million subscribers, which compared to Russia's 155,000. In the days of old an ordinary telephone number had four digits, while large cities used five-digit numbers. To attain a person beyond city bounds by telephone, yous would normally accept to tell the operator the name of the city and a number. A telephone call used to be pre-ordered, which took some waiting.
In the 1910s automatic telephone switches started to supplant hullo girls who made connections manually. By the beginning of the First World War the USA had over 100 automatic telephone switches, Germany—7, Great Britain—2. Moscow saw the get-go automated phone switch installed not sooner than in 1924, and that ane was in the Kremlin. The urban center automatic telephone switch started operation in 1930.
How they did information technology
Americans who were to run into the problem of 7-digit numbers sooner that whatsoever other nation, establish a mnemonic solution to the problem (it was more often than not believed back then that 7-digit numbers were difficult to memorize): the first three digits were replaced with messages some discussion started with. For technical reasons no phone number in the United states started with 1. For historical reasons zero was always used to call the operator. Equally a result, whatsoever American telephone number could offset with any figure but 1 and 0.
Mnemonic rules were in employ in London and Paris until mid-1960s. At first Americans adopted the LLL-NNNN format (three letters, iv numerals). Subsequently becoming enlightened that it was running out of words beginning with the needed iii messages, New York introduced the LLN-NNNN format in 1930 with all the other cities following suit in 1947–48.
Telephone numbers were written (and pronounced) as follows:
1924. Telephone number TREmont 3106 (873-3106)
1948. Telephone number HArrison 7-8723 (427-8723)
1960. BUtterfield viii (288), a film starring Elizabeth Taylor
How nosotros did it
Everything associated with a phone (from telephone sets to stations) came to Russia from the West. In 1881 the American Bell Telephone Company signed a 20-year contract with Russian federation on installation and operation of telephone networks in Petrograd, Moscow, Warsaw, Odessa, Riga and Lodz.
LM Ericsson and Co. opened its outset Russian telephone station in 1893 in Kiev. In the late 19th century for the old owner of a mechanical repair shop Lars Magnus Ericsson Russia was the biggest sales marketplace—he even considered moving to St. petersburg. Hither'south how Ericsson described it in the 1997 annual report: "As early every bit the late 1890s, Ericsson had operations worldwide—including countries such every bit China, Russia and Mexico".
In 1900 Ericsson built its first foreign factory in Leningrad. In 1927 it was renamed into Krasnaya Zarya (Cherry Dawn) and started to produce showtime Soviet phone sets.
I of Europe's largest telephone stations endemic by the Russian-Dutch-Swedish articulation-stock visitor was located in the Milyutinsky by-street in Moscow (the building is still used as a call heart). In 1917 during the Great Socialist Revolution the building with cadets holed upwardly within was besieged by revolutionary insurgents. Five days into the siege, none of the cadets remained, while out of 60,000 lines only around 10,000 were operating. In 1920 Sovnarkom (the Quango of People's Commissars) decreed that all telephone sets be seized from private individuals owing to a dire shortage of numbers.
Housekeeping tip
Automatic dialing was possible with a rotary punch telephone set. Prior telephone models were directly connected to the operator or had a magneto (a rotating handle on the right hand side spinning which yous also connected to the telephone girl). Telephones with a rotary dial were a rarity. They were only installed in loftier-ranking officials' offices (200 lines in the Kremlin and 20 lines in the Russian Council of People's Economy). This sort of a phone set was called "vertushka" ("whizzer"). These days this word is remaining in the Russian language to denote a direct government phone in a kingpin's office, although modern "whizzers" have either a push button-button punch or none at all.
The last thing for the USSR government to become worried most in the 1920s was creating a organisation of mnemonic rules to make the memorizing of telephone numbers easier. At that time numbers similar Fifty-NN-NN (i letter, 4 numerals) were pretty common. Later an automated telephone switch came into apply that had two-letter indices. Simply each letter being pronounced separately fabricated memorizing the numbers a alpine guild. Messages followed by numerals were in broad utilise in the USSR until 1968.
1968. A notification flyer about abolishing letters in Moscow telephone numbers (from MGTS website):
"In1968 all Messages of Moscow phone numbers are REPLACED WITH NUMERALS
BEFORE
At present
One thousand v 33 36
9 5 33 36
Eastward i 33 36
half-dozen 1 33 36
AБ 2 33 36
12 ii 33 36
AB five 33 36
xiii five 33 36"
1970. A flyer for city telephone network subscribers issued by the Svyaz Publishing Business firm (from the writer's collection):
"DIAL THE TELEPHONE NUMBER IN NUMERALS ONLY The Soviet Union has adopted the single long-distance numeric system of telephone numbers."
How they used to phone call
The start phones didn't accept a dial. In the Moscow Telephone Network Subscribers Directory published in 1916 the first article of the rules of utilize reads as follows: "The cardinal station is called by taking the microtelephone off the claw. The operator at the station should respond by telling her number. Afterwards the subscriber shall clearly pronounce the number to which he wishes to be connected".
The first telephone sets with rotary dials had only numerals on them. In the 1920s letters standing beside numerals came into use.
In the USA on a telephone dial iii messages of the English alphabet used to stand beside each numeral (but 1 and 0). The messages Q and Z were not in utilise owing to their visual similarity to0 and 2.
The English used to place the letter O near zero—they looked the same anyway.
The Swedish and the German language used i letter per each numeral: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, J, One thousand, thus taking upwards all of the ten numerals. The letter I wasn't used to avoid its defoliation with i.
In the USSR there were also 10 letters standing beside numerals on a dial: А, Б, В, Г, Д, Е, Ж, И, К, Л. The alphabetic character З wasn't used non to be confused with iii.
How they telephone call
In today's Russia no telephones with Russian letters are produced. Many European telephones don't have whatsoever messages at all. All American telephones have messages standing beside numerals.
All modern mobile phones (no exceptions) sport the total Latin alphabet (some models as well have the Russian one). Here'south where the trouble with two ways of using the letters starts. If you are driving on a highway and see the words "How am I driving? Call one-800-EAT-SHIT" on a huge truck, it means you are suggested to call ane-800-328-7448.
But when you type an SMS, letters work in another mode: to choose a letter, pushing the relevant push button once is sometimes non plenty—yous'll have to push button information technology several times to go the right letter.
The letter dialing organisation is well-known in the USA: memorizing a word is easier than memorizing a set of figures, although typing them after is awfully difficult. Europeans who know what SMS is really have no thought about how the American system works.
In Russia, there'south only one company to risk using this mnemonic method so far to annunciate its telephone number—Megafon, a telecom operator advertizing the number 500-ALLO (500-25-56) in Moscow. The writer doesn't know whether in that location has been whatsoever success implementing this motility.
Typical Soviet rotary punch of a home phone set VEF, 1965, USSR
Typical American rotary dial of a city telephone set up Western Electrical, model Princess, 1963, USA
Rotary dial without letters Automated Electric, 1919, USA
Lettered buttons of a typical office telephone Panasonic, the 1980s, U.s.
Obiter dictum
Later on the touch-tone dial was invented in 1961, the position of numerals on a dial was discussed by Bell engineers. Several proposals were in consideration, one of them—positioning the buttons in a circle like on a rotary dial. The idea behind this was that it would exist hard for people to bang change over to a wholly new system.
However, studies showed that people quickly got the hang of whatever ordered position of buttons. Therefore a decision was made to adapt the buttons in three rows, iii buttons in a row, in the society that people already knew—zero following ix, that is, as on the rotary dial.
For a counting machine, though, it is logical to have zero preceding one.
Writing phone numbers correctly In Europe telephone numbers have always been separate in ii-digit groups.
In French republic and the Great Duchy of Luxembourg dots or blanks are used to dissever numbers (eight-digit telephone numbers with an surface area code): XX.Xx.Xx.XX.XX XX XX Xx XX 20 0 800 XX Xx Twenty
In Germany blanks (more rarely—hyphens) are used: XXX 20 XX Xxx-Twenty-XX 00 49 (20 XX) 20 XX Xx (0 Xx XX) X Xx
In Bulgaria a telephone number is always written in three 2-digit groups: Xx-XX-20
A special case is Italian republic and The netherlands where telephone numbers are often written in a continuous string of figures with no spaces: XX XXXXXXX, 020-XXXXXXX—a real scourge for people hurting their eyes if non to memorize the number, and then at least to make it out. The lack of a separating character is sorely felt in the telephone book of a mobile telephone when you accept to screw up your eyes to pick each of the ten figures melted together.
In the UK (that has a lot of common with the US in terms of technical standards) phone numbers are written in two groups of numerals: 020 XXXX XXXX +44 20 XXXX XXXX 0XXXX XXXXXX (except London) 0800 XXXXXX (gratis numbers)
Information technology'due south worth mentioning hither that in oral English big numerals are customarily broken down into groups. The year 1998 would be pronounced "nineteen 90 eight", not "one thousand ix hundred and ninety eight". Sometimes numerals are pronounced in single digits.
The current American phone number format was influenced past the early on evolution of the telecom industry, the problem of long numbers and mnemonic rules.
In Russia (and in the USSR) all telephone numbers were written according to the dominion: pairs of digits were separated with a hyphen or a blank from right to left. If three numbers happen to stand at the start of the number, they are allowed to be grouped together.
Article three of the rules attached to the Moscow Telephone Network Subscribers Directory, 1916, reads:
"Numbers over a hundred are to be pronounced every bit follows: 1.23—one twenty three, 9.72—9 seventy 2, 70.09—70 zero 9. In numbers over ten,000 every figure of a hundred should exist pronounced separately, for case, 1.20.48—ane 20 forty eight, 2.08.35—two nada eight thirty 5, 3.35.29—three xxx five 20 nine, 4.49.52—four forty nine fifty ii, 5.15.86—five fifteen eighty six etc., not one hundred and twenty forty 8, two hundred and 8 xxx five etc."
These rules are well-known past military signalers: pronouncing numbers in ii-digit groups diminishes the probability of mistake by the receiver (listener).
The telephone number format for Russia, CIS member states and Baltic countries is as follows: Thirty-Xx-20. Many former Soviet republics adopted the American format (XXX-XXXX), forgetting all almost its cultural, historical and semantic implications. In phone directories hyphens were replaced with blanks (to save compositors' fourth dimension and effort):
1916. Moscow Telephone Network Subscribers Directory (from the author's collection)
1960. Directory of Moscow City Phone Network Subscribers. Private Telephones (from the author'south collection)
1975. Directory of Moscow City Phone Network Subscribers. Telephones of Organizations, Institutions and Enterprises (from the writer'due south collection)
In the USSR words failed to stick because at that place aren't plenty of words to be made from the first 10 messages (placing all of the 33 messages of the alphabet on the dial was then believed unreasonable). Coupled with very complex numerals, writing phone numbers in two-digit groups was the best pick.
Except in few cases of lucky numbers (like 222-3-222), in today's Russia a telephone number should exist written as follows:
123-45-67 12-34-56 ane-23-45 12-34 (for ordinary city numbers)
(123) 123-45-67 (1234) 12-34-56 (12345) 1-23-45 (123456) 12-34 (for numbers with an area code)
8 123 123-45-67 (for mobile phone numbers)
+7 123 123-45-67 +vii 1234 12-34-56 +7 12345 1-23-45 +vii 123456 12-34 (for Russian phone numbers called from strange countries)
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