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Gillian Slade
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By the 1920s, telephones were about to
revolutionize the way business was done and private switchboards
were becoming the life-blood of any large business, including
Medicine Hat’s Cosmopolitan Hotel, whose switchboard is now
part of the Esplanade Museum collection. Motels and hotels proudly
advertised that there was “a telephone in each
room.”
A strict protocol evolved about the manner
in which a phone was answered at a business and it never faltered
in business-like courtesy and efficiency. Operators knew who was in
the office and who was out and who the public needed to talk with.
In many ways she (almost always a woman) was the pulse of the
business.
For staff that had a phone on their desk
they still relied on the company operator to dial their call and
get the required party on the line through the private switchboard.
No call was made or received without the knowledge and assistance
of the company operator.
Gail Ferris of Medicine Hat, whose
distinguished career with AGT spanned 25 years, was her
company’s link with the business community as Hatters
embraced the advances in telephone equipment.
"By the time automatic and electronic
switchboards were being installed in offices, I was establishing a
training program for staff at companies that needed to know how to
use these machines to maximum benefit," said Ferris.
Towards the end of the 80s, options such
as automatic re-dialing and picking up a call from another phone
were new and exciting.
"The most dramatic change was the
introduction of the automated attendant," said Ferris. The much
respected company operator was to be replaced by a recorded
voice.
It was Ferris's voice, which many
consider smooth and velvety, that was often used to record the
options for businesses. In fact, it is still her recorded voice
that you hear when calling The News.
"I still meet people who recognize my
voice," says Ferris. She admits to feeling there was a loss of
corporate identity when a pre-recorded message became the voice for
a business. "I think it became more cold and unfriendly," said
Ferris.
In the telephone industry in general,
postwar progress became visible in 1953 when AGT had trebled in
nearly all departments, said Tony Cashman, author of Singing Wires
— The Telephone in Alberta.
"There were 2,000 employees at AGT,
province-wide, and 100,000 telephones. A revolutionary design for
pay-phone-booths finally made it possible for phones to work
outdoors throughout the cold winter months.
The 1970s were the beginning of the end of
the party-line system and for many that was the loss of a social
institution, says Cashman. Neighbours could no longer hear how many
calls each was receiving and conference calls with "rubbernecks"
(listening in) were a thing of the past.
Direct distance dialing was introduced to
the Hat in 1973 and by 1977, touch tone calling arrived, thanks to
a very large computer system. "Only a computer could make sense of
the punched tapes that recorded calls and appropriate charges
without an operator," said Cashman.
On Jan. 8, 1977, The News announced, "When
AGT switches on its new equipment at noon today, calls will be
completed 10 times faster, phone call capacity increased by 5,000,
and if you accidentally leave your telephone off the hook, it will
"howl" at you."
Medicine Hat opened its first
“phonecentre” in March of 1977, an exciting new concept
serving about 7,500 customers a month. "Customers appreciate the
opportunity to shop for phones, make inquiries and pay their
accounts all in one location," said manager Al Widmer.
Phonecentre encouraged customers to
browse, see, try and choose phones from the variety of models and
colours displayed and then simply take them home and plug them in,
said Widmer.
In January, 1979, Medicine Hat was the
fifth community in Alberta to obtain a new long distance service,
Zero Plus Number dialing, that no longer required the assistance of
an operator for many calls. The $1 million project saw installation
of the most advanced switchboards and equipment which allowed
customers to dial-collect calls, third-party billing,
person-to-person, and credit card calls.
The service also applied to calls being
made from any of the 295 pay phones in the Hat and the surrounding
area.
Everyone was invited to attend AGT's open
house at the AGT Toll Building 456 Fifth Street S.E. It was a
chance to see the world's most modern switchboard, and watch a
demonstration of how AGT could connect people to the world.
"Tomorrow's telecommunications technology today," it advertised
proudly.
From barbed-wire phones to cell phones in
a changing world. Where will technology take us in the next
century? |
