Hard to believe…

[dhal22]

Yep, you couldn't break those things without a lot of effort.
Some kind of super plastic technology that has been lost to time.

Bakelite I think.

 

[THREEJAYS]

Never could stay on long cause everyone was waiting

 

[Boogar Presley]

You could let it ring 40 times before it went "deet deet deet deet deet deet deet"

 

[GAK9]

I remember making long distance calls and the operator getting on the line and asking what my telephone number was, so they could bill the call to us. We used to always give a number that was 1 digit off from ours and never got charged for it. I wonder how many of those others had to pay for or if they denied making them and got them removed?

 

[buellbrewer]

in my office. not rotary old but still... this is in my office/lab and of course no longer works..

 

[HERMET]

You didn't mess with "Ma Bell" either.

 

[41mag]

Classic ! Good stuff ^^

 

[lostchild]

Used to work residence phone repair for Ma Bell back in those days.
The stories I’ve got….

 

[thevalueman]

My dad had a friend in Florida...they worked out a plan where one would call the other using a fake name, the receiver of the call, and anyone in the house knew to say "he's not here", then they would call back...that saved the the extra fee of the old "person to person" call

 

[Carlos .45]

We had one one the wall in the middle of the house. My in laws had a supper long cord. We even have an old telephone chair. Remember when they used to charge extra for more than one phone in the house? Remember Ma Bell? Sarah get me so and so.........And last, but not least BR549.........Seems I may have an old rotary dial around somewhere

My brother and I learned how to disconnect a wire in the outlet for an "extra free phone", the phone would not ring and Ma Bell would not know.