Today is International Find a Pay Phone Booth Day. If, for some reason, you’ve tried to find one lately, you know that they are on the endangered species list. I have heard that pay phone booths are still “out there,” but I haven’t seen one in a long time. So I guess that this is a call for action day. I would assume that the reason for this day is to encourage everyone to go out and find a pay phone booth.
Since this blog is notorious for keeping readers informed, I should mention that the first pay phone booth was called a telephone cabinet. The first phone booths were enclosed, rectangular boxes, made of wooden frames with glass walls — later models were made of metal frames and usually plexiglass walls.
When I was young, you could find a phone booth just about anywhere you looked. They were on street corners, restaurants and all public buildings like court houses, airports, and bus or train stations. The arrival of cell phones was the kiss of death for phone booths, and it happened very fast. I’m not aware of any pay phones in Shepherdstown, but I’ve been told there ares a few, that still work, in the surrounding area. Just another thing you can tell your grandkids about that they won’t know what you’re talking about.
Alexander Graham Bell was granted the first patent for his telephone on March 7, 1876, and made the world’s first telephone call on March 10, 1876 — making this a very appropriate date for International Find a Pay Phone Booth Day. Phone service was established at the White House one year after its invention, making Rutherford B. Hayes the first president to have telephone service.
Again, following this blog’s policy for keeping you informed — Alexander Graham Bell refused to have a telephone in his study because he was afraid it would distract him from his scientific work. I’m pretty sure he could already foresee all the spam calls.
Thomas Doolittle invented the first telephone booth in 1878 —users could place calls between two towns for 15 cents. The booth was patented in 1883.
Originally, all phone booths could receive incoming calls… people could wait for a call, or a call-back. The incoming call feature was stopped sometime in the 1980s — the phone company claimed it helped drug dealers.
International Find a Pay Telephone Booth Day was created by Bob Matthews of Rochester, NY in 2018. He happened to stumble on a phone booth in a local mall and realized they were becoming increasingly rare and thought it important recognize this soon to be relic before they completely disappeared.
I encourage everyone to make a concentrated effort to find a phone booth today — this is not one of those phony holidays. The disappearance of phone booths is a serious problem and if we fail to act we can only blame ourselves for the rise in crime and violence. We removed all the phone booths and now Superman has nowhere to change.
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