![]() Workers had to scan thousands of tiny jacks, always keeping an eye open for lights indicating new calls and ones that ended. Operator jobs were frenetic and repetitive. By 1900, more than 80% of operators were White, single, US-born women. Telephone companies sought female operators who would project a "comfortable and genteel image to their customers," Kenneth Lipartito, a professor of history at Florida International University, wrote in a 1994 paper "When Women Were Switches."Ĭompanies rejected Black and ethnic workers with accents, and policies barred female operators from being married. Companies could also pay them less than men. Male managers decided that women were better suited to answering and connecting calls from rude customers because they were seen as more docile and polite. The FCC estimated then that 71 million calls annually were placed to 411. "411 usage is not insignificant," the FCC said in a 2019 report. In 2021, there were fewer than 4,000 telephone operators, down from a peak of around 420,000 in the 1970s, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data.īut there are still people who call the operator and request directory help. The advance of technology like the internet and smartphones, the deregulation of the telecomms industry in the 1980s, and other factors have left human operators virtually extinct. Three decades later, a Bell company said a customer called to ask the operator if he was a mammal, "like a whale," while a woman wanted to know how to get a squirrel out of her house, according to Goodmann. On Halloween eve in 1938, during Orson Welles' radio broadcast of "War of the Worlds," New Jersey residents believed martians were invading and frantically phoned the operator for information on the invasion and to connect them with loved ones before the world ended. "Telephone users interpreted her as an efficient way to locate any information," wrote Emma Goodmann, an assistant professor of communication at Clarke University, in her 2019 paper on the history of telephone operators. Well into the 20th century, AT&T offered weather, bus schedules, sports scores, time and date, election results and other information requests. The job came to be occupied mostly by single, middle-class White women, often known as "Hello Girls." The Bell System, known as Ma Bell, advertised its mostly female ranks of operators as servile and attentive - "The Voice with a Smile" - to attract and maintain customers. The operator became the early face of the telephone, a human behind an emerging and complex technology. ![]() The operator was the essential link in the dominant Bell System, owned by American Telephone & Telegraph (AT&T), telecommunications network. Operator services were a selling point to customers during the late 1800s and early 1900s. There's a wonderful circularity there," said Josh Lauer, an associate professor of media studies at the University of New Hampshire who is writing a book on the cultural history of the telephone. So a request for John Smith living in Seattle would look like this: Smith John.Seattle."The operator was the internet before the internet. ![]() To request the telephone number, users would type in the first name, followed by last name, a dot and finally the city. To get the TXT-411 directory assistance, the dialer first needs to activate the e-mail program, then dial the e-mail address for TXT-411, which is 2411. Pemble said TXT-411 saves callers more than half the price of dialing 411, which could be an incentive to use a cell phone's cramped keypad to enter names and navigate a menu of choices rather than dialing three numbers.ĪT&T charges $1.25 to dial 411, and 50 cents to use TXT-411 for a phone number, or $1.10 for driving directions. AT&T says it's the first to use SMS in directory assistance and expects other carriers to follow. The company said it will not have to hire new operators for the service, and won't cut back on its regular 411 service. Companies have been hunting for revenue in other areas, for instance services that provide directions.ĪT&T Wireless said the service is inexpensive to implement and maintain. ![]() ![]() telephone companies are desperate for new revenue sources because of ongoing grim economic conditions. ![]()
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