There is a website that is devoted to preserving and listing the names of
local telephone exchanges from around the country.  It is well worth
visiting at: http://ourwebhome.com/TENP/TENproject.html

I have NO connection with this site, except as fascinated visitor.

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Philip M. Katz
Director of Public Programs
New York Council for the Humanities
150 Broadway, Suite 1700
New York, NY  10038
(212) 233-1131, ext 29
www.culturefront.org
-----Original Message-----
From: Daniel H. Weiskotten <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Friday, February 26, 1999 9:21 AM
Subject: Butterfield 8


>Since the topic has been brought up - just how did the first three digits
>of phone numbers (not the area code) get started or assigned?  Is it a
>regional development from the early local company number assignments (such
>as "Operator ... W-7 please")?  when I was a kid (not too long ago!) we had
>Oldfield 5 which translated on the dial as 655, but no one ever seemed to
>know where the "Oldfield" came from - which came first - the numbers or the
>letters?  Were they devised on some logical plan like the compass system
>used on the Rural Indexes?  Was it a local thing devised by the local
>companies and then modified when they were gobbled up by Ma Bell???
>
>Just curious.
>
>Dan W.