h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Another excellent and educational piece about telephone etiquette - thank you for investing in it! Impressive what can be found in the boxes of sheet music (I enjoy rummaging in those myself when I get the opportunity )

It is interesting what people often don't get taught, but that would have been useful at the time, such as not needing to shout down the telephone line as if you're shouting to the person far away I didn't know it was a 'finger stop', though, and I used the dial phones for several years in my youth

Interesting about the gender politics, and clever use of pronouns as well (more forward thinking than the publishers of the book I found...).

The etiquette about how long to let the telephone ring for is one that would be useful for the modern age. A minute is too long if someone is sitting at a desk in an office, but alternatively my former boss expected me to pick up the phone within 3 rings, which was a bit short. Especially because unfortunately the phone was such that it rang 3 times in his ear, but only rang twice on my desk in the same amount of time, so I missed 50% of his calls... This made him very angry until the next time he was physically in the office and I could explain what was going on...

Lovely about what has been written in the booklet! "I really hope she found Helene Henderson's number before it was too late to invite her to the party." I like written on postcards as snapshots of people's thoughts, too - my favourite in my collection is "You might wonder what I have been doing today, and I can only say GEOMETRY"

I don't have any experience of party lines, so they just make me think of the film Pillow Talk with Doris Day and Rock Hudson

I can imagine a whole scenario involving 'GEOMETRY!' I love those glimpses into the past, too.

My grandparents were on a party line, up in the hills in Tennessee. This was fine until my uncle moved in a mile down the road, and their farm was on the same line...his wife suspected her mother-in-law, my grandmother, of not always following the rules in this book... Well, they could only two TV stations up there, and those not very well...

Still, telephones were a step above the usual method of communication, which was basically yodelling...the cows responded to this very well, but half my relatives were mostly deaf.

I still have my old dial phone, though it isn't connected as my wife doesn't like it and we have a generic modern button phone that has a built-in answerphone and caller display instead. I always wanted a mobile phone with a dial - as everything has buttons these days, it gives the humble dial phone an aura of mystery.

My mobile is now 8 years old and cost me £10 – it just has to last two more years and then I'll consider it good value for money.

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Ah, yes - definite temptation with a party line...

Yeah, the dial phones aren't the best these days, as people do need the ability to 'Press 3 if you would like to speak to a person'. A mobile phone with a dial would be awesome, though

That will be good value for money indeed - my phone is 11 but it did set me back £50... However, I got my money's worth out if it when it had the ability to connect to 'the internet' (aka 5 webpages consisting of 400 pixels each with fun quizzes on)

BB, you need to get hold of one of those handsets the linemen have - they're mobile with a rotary dial...

http://www.etsy.com/listing/547702081/1950s-linemans-pin-rotary-dial-bakelite?gpla=1&gao=1&&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=shopping_us_a-electronics_and_accessories-telephones_and_handsets&utm_custom1=7e9fa514-1930-4e33-94bb-b7196205dbbb&gclid=Cj0KCQiA84rQBRDCARIsAPO8RFzxjieE5sF5J9uCAYdLOkz9nzM4Ao8kHo67V2XlaxU9SwVsYF54Ze4aApdBEALw_wcB

There are linemen outside Wichita?

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Yeah, if it snows, that stretch down south won't ever stand the strain...