Telephones

"You'll like our prompt cleaning. Phone us for convenient, careful service. Keemer Cleaner, Lincoln Highway East, phone 4-3721."

A hold it photo (people holding something) for the Vintage Photos Theme Park . Caption: "By durn, Samenthy, this beats the old pump all holler. Push jest a leetle harder and she'll be here." Sign on wall: "Hotel Astorf-Waldoria. Ring once for bell boy, twice [for] ice water, three [times for] hot water." Name on trunk: "Silas Green, Wayback, O." Printed along the sides: "The 'Perfec' Stereograph. (Trade mark.) Patented April 14, 1903. Other patents pending. H. C. White Co., Publishers. General offices and works, North Bennington, Vt., U.S.A. Copyright 1903 by H. C. White Co. 5587 (2)." This comic stereoscopic card (see the full card below) shows two country bumpkins who are visting the city and staying at the highfalutin Hotel Astorf-Waldoria (a thinly veiled reference, of course, to the Waldorf-Astoria in New York City). Unfamiliar with big-city ways and new-fangled technology, Samantha (or "Samenthy," as her husband Silas pronounces it) is pushing the call button (normally used to summon hotel staff) while Silas holds a water pitcher below the mouthpiece of the wall-mounted telephone. In their naivety, Samantha and Silas have misunderstood the sign ("Ring twice for ice water") and have mistaken the phone for a pump that will provide water once the button is pushed. In 1903, at a time when indoor plumbing and telephones were less common in rural areas, viewers of this stereographic photo could laugh at the silly antics of this foolish backwoods couple from Wayback, Ohio. Looking at the image a hundred years later, we can catch a glimpse of the different styles of clothing, wallpaper, carpet, and furniture that were popular back then, and we can also consider how the modern technology that we take for granted today--faucets with running water and mobile phones--has made the humor here obsolete.

A comic stereoscopic card. For additional information, see Silas and Samantha at the Astorf-Waldoria, 1903 .

Big hands, small woman, and general peculiarity for the Weird Vintage Postcards group.

"Compliments of S. Kronenberg's Sons, clothing, 6-8 S. Hanover St., Carlisle, Pa. A bit of gossip. Copyright, 1911, R. Hill. January 1913."

"The Telephone Matches, special safety matches. Trade mark, made in Sweden. Average contents 60 matches per box." For some additional examples of matchbook labels, see below:

"The boys keep me busy at the phone in Jersey Shore, Pa., so excuse me for not writing sooner."

"Hello! Who is this? You're the one we're after. Missed you last Sunday. Come to Sunday school next Sunday sure! A. B. C. No. 56. Copyright, 1917, the Standard Publishing Co., Cincinnati, O." For other don't-forget-to-attend-Sunday-school postcards, see One Out of Our Sunday-School Class Last Sunday and Sorry You Were Sick Last Sunday .

The Bellevue Stratford, Phila., Pa. Talk through this disc. Hygiene Telephone Disc. A new one for each guest occupying this room. Talk through the Hygienic Telephone Disc and protect yourself from all germ disease. Replace when soiled. U.S. Patent, June 12, 1906. To put on, bend up small corner on line and slide on mouthpiece. Mfg. by Hygienic Telephone Disc Co., Phila., Pa. -------- Worrying about germs and the spread of diseases is nothing new, as this early twentieth-century "Hygienic Telephone Disc" demonstrates. Guests at the Bellevue Stratford Hotel in Philadelphia could place one of these "Sani-Phone" discs--as they were also called--over the mouthpieces of the telephones in their rooms so they wouldn't contract tuberculosis or any other nasty bug. The discs used a wax paper-like film that was sandwiched between two layers of cardboard to keep germs away while letting sound through. For a 1912 advertisement that shows how the disc was placed on the candlestick telephones of the time, see Sani-Phone Hygienic Telephone Discs Ad, World Almanac and Encyclopedia, 1912 (Internet Archive) :

This Sani-Phone Hygienic Telephone Discs advertisement is a screen capture from the World Almanac and Encyclopedia, 1912 , p. xiv, which is available via the Internet Archive . For an example of a disc imprinted with a hotel's name, see Hygienic Telephone Disc, Bellevue-Stratford Hotel, Philadelphia, Pa., 1906 :

A taken unawares photo (shots of people who clearly have no idea they're being snapped) for the Vintage Photos Theme Park. A photo of the W. L. Zimmerman and Sons grocery store in Intercourse , Pennsylvania, shows an Amishman with his horse and buggy (mouse over the image above for an enlargement that makes it easier to see the man in his dark clothes). Since the Amish religion prohibits photography, it's likely that the man in this photo was either unaware that he was being photographed or else he did spot the photographer and turned his back to the camera. As scholar Donald B. Kraybill explained in a Top Ten FAQ about the Amish for the PBS Web site, "Amish churches forbid individuals to pose for face-on photos for two reasons. First, they cite the second of the Bible's Ten Commandments: 'Thou shalt not make… any graven image, or any likeness of any thing….' (Exodous 20:14). Second, in a communal society that values humility, posing for photos is a sign of pride that calls attention to oneself and rubs against Amish beliefs about the importance of deferring and yielding to others." It's ironic, then, that this grocery store appeared in the 1985 film Witness when actor Harrison Ford, who played the part of an undercover detective dressed in Amish garb, made a call from a telephone booth located on the porch of the store. That was a later phone booth, since the booth visible in this photo is the small but elaborate building situated between the buggy and the Gulf gas pumps (it has a "Zimmerman's Store" sign on one side and a very faint "Enterprise Telephone Co." sign painted above its front door). Unfortunately, Zimmerman's grocery store (the sign partially visible beyond the phone booth probably refers to "[Lanco] Service Stores," a local affiliation of independent grocers) went out of business in 2014. The store's role in Witness was described in " Lancaster County Grocery Store Featured in Harrison Ford Movie Closes Its Doors ," an article by Tim Stuhldreher that appeared on LancasterOnline, April 3, 2014. Check out Google's street view of this same scene, which dates to 2011 when the store was still open.

For information about this photo, see An Amishman and His Buggy at Zimmerman's Store, Intercourse, Pa. :

"Econo-Phone. Telephones, accessories, electronics." What telephones used to look like. An advertising postcard for a store in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

"Wishing you a fortune in happiness! Mr. Fortune. WCBM." Homer Todd, shown here holding a telephone handset and sitting in front of a microphone in this postcard-sized promotional photo, originated the Dialing for Dollars program on Baltimore, Maryland, radio station WCBM in 1939. As "Mr. Fortune," he would randomly call phone numbers and award cash prizes to listeners who answered the phone and could tell him the amount of money he was offering as a prize (the amount increased each time the phone went unanswered or the wrong amount was given as an answer). Dialing for Dollars turned out to be wildly successful and was carried on many different stations as a franchised program first on radio and then on television into the 1970s. Todd--his full name was Homer Ulric Todd, Jr.--apparently continued his career as Mr. Fortune at WCBM until at least 1950. He passed away in 1967 at the age of 56. .

"Hello - Merry Christmas." An early twentieth-century postcard featuring cutting-edge candlestick telephone communications technology. See also Hello, Merry Christmas! Operator, Can You Help Me, Help Me If You Please .

An advertising postcard addressed on the other side to Mr. Wm. P. Breen, Fort Wayne, Ind., and postmarked New Haven, Conn., June 8, 1911. Off to Europe Visiting Ireland, England, Scotland, Belgium, France, Germany Switzerland. Are you coming with us? We must know soon. Party sails from New York, July 8. 'Phone, wire, or write for reservations. A few choice berths left. Columbus Travel Society, New York office, 2075 Metropolitan Building. Gramercy 3438. Prof. J. C. Monaghan, pres. Mrs. B. Ellen Burke, sec'y. D. P. Toomey, treas.

A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the theme of telephones. "Merry Christmas. Sophie, Grant, and Kurt Stetzler." A photographic Christmas card dating to the late 1950s.