Just a refresher, the telephone, invented by Alexander Graham Bell, transmits our words into electrical/optical/radio signals via the network containing both transmitters and receivers. The soundwaves are turned into electromagnetic signals that are turned back to sound at its destination. The reason for this background is that a lot of my dad’s memories have technical aspects to them.  This system was prevalent in bigger cities and more populated areas, until a group of farmers got together and formed the Rural Cooperative Association which used a business model that leveraged cost sharing to get resources to rural communities, like Spearville. Dad relayed several memories of working with the telephone company. The “central office”, which was a building just south of where the Spearville News, contained an “updated” mechanical version of the old-time telephone operators. These mechanisms operated in x/y direction, so when the person picked up the receiver the switch would come out then go over to the number you dialed. This operation made a typical “chatter” type sound as dad relayed. When the wind was blowing real hard, before telephone lines were buried, the line swing would eventually get “off phase” and contact each other. The system was faked out and thought someone had picked up their phone. During a wind storm it made even more chatter. This system was an improvement from the previous “operators” (like Ruth Buzzy-sort of) who answered the phone and connected your calls. These operators worked in a shack out back of the original Telephone office in a house on Stafford street. When the Telephone office moved to the new building it sold the place to my Uncle Alvin Mages, Telephone employee/manager, who lived and raised his family from that house.