DEVELOPMENT IN TELEPHONE SERVICE 241 



necessarily temporary character of much of the construction. The public had 

 to be personally taught to use the new system, and our operators had to be 

 educated in its rapid use. This naturally caused dissatisfaction, and before 

 the system was tried and the construction trouble was eliminated, our sub- 

 scribers, through misapprehension of the real purpose of the change, were 

 invited to meet and form an association to protect their interests and compel 

 satisfactory and perfect service on our part. . . . The association was soon 

 compelled to acknowledge the superiority of the new service over that of the old. 



In March, 1883, there were thirty Gilliland switchboards (Fig. 21) 

 in the Pearl Street telephone exchange in Boston, and seventy-five toll 

 lines terminated there. These boards stood about a foot apart and were 

 displaced by a given number of multiple sections forming one compact, 

 continuous board. In referring to the installation of the multiple 

 switchboard in this exchange in 1884, Mr. Carty stated that 



there were about 1,650 subscribers, ninety branch and thirty extra-territorial 

 lines. The extra-territorial lines were handled by five operators on the 

 25-wire boards, on each of which there were a dozen or more subscribers. This 

 called for a force of thirty-nine operators on tables at any one time, seven 

 operators for relief and seven night operators, making a total force of fifty- 

 three. With the multiple system only twenty operators are required to fill 

 the boards in the main exchange, with five relief and four night operators. 

 In the toll room, eleven operators are required, including the chief, one relief 

 and two night operators. This makes a total of forty operators, handling 

 1,700 subscribers, 152 trunk lines, and shows a saving of thirteen operators. 



Incidentally, it may be added that the Boston board was put in at an 

 expense of $48,000. The old boards cost over $20,000, but brought 

 less than one tenth that sum when sold as junk, though in use less 

 than four years, and some less than two years. 



In September, 1885, Mr. T. D. Lockwood suggested that where the 

 multiple board was to be installed it would be well 



to get the numbers drilled into the subscribers first. I was in Baltimore eighteen 

 months ago, when the subscribers were all known by name. They were going to 

 change that, and they were also introducing the multiple boards at the same 

 time; and the operation of the new multiple boards was somewhat premature, 

 because the old boards fell to pieces about a week before the new ones were 

 expected and the change had to be made very quickly, and the change from 

 names to numbers, and from the old board to the multiple board resulted in 

 producing a condition of things very like a pandemonium for three or four days. 



That the Western Union's competitive telephone service was of no 

 better character than that of the Bell, notwithstanding its long ex- 

 perience in serving the public and the far greater resources at its 

 command, is clearly portrayed in a description by a Times reporter, of 

 a visit to the Chicago exchange of the American District Telegraph 

 Company, in July, 1879. He wrote: 



The racket is almost deafening. There are speaking tubes running all 

 about the room, which look not unlike small stovepipes, and at one end and 

 the other of these are placed the lips of one operator and the ear of another. 

 Boys and girls are rushing madly hither and thither, seemingly without 

 intent or direction; while others are putting in and taking out pegs from the 

 metallic surface of the central framework or switchboard as if they were 

 lunatics engaged in an old-fashioned game of fox and geese. 



How different are present-day conditions in the large exchanges, 

 where the operating force is well disciplined and thoroughly trained, 



