I'm So Old...

[T1 Terry]

We didn't get TV until I was 12yrs old, but the grand parents had TV up in Heathcote on the Sydney out skirts. The TV antenna was so high it had 4 lots of ropes on it and screamed in the high winds.
I think I was 14 before mum got the phone connected and then it was only because my sister needed a contact phone number for work ..... It had a lock in the dial so we couldn't run up a huge bill and had to pay for the call to get the lock removed .....
I do remember my sister and BIL had a wind up phone, you counted the number of rings to see if the call was for you or not, I think there were 7 other properties on the same line ..... a hard and fast rule, no phone calls after 8pm unless you needed a doctor .... everyone on the line had their phone ring when you tried to dial out
Aunty and uncle lived in Bexley (Sydney suburb) uncle was a senior detective inspector, 3 different colour phones and no one but my uncle was allowed to answer one of them if it rang ..... think it was either white or red, just like the movies the black phone a a free for all with 3 teenage daughters still living at home .... they even had one of those stupid phones with the dial on the bottom of the hand piece, when you put it down to get who ever the call was for, the thing hung up .....

T1 Terry

[Shirley]

Now Terry even many of the kids have a mobile phone in their pocket, I remember & I have posted same before being the only home in our street that had a telephone connected, we have all certainly lived thru a great upgrade in communication technology.
My sister as a young girl worked at the telephone exchange in Sydney.

[T1 Terry]

Now Terry even many of the kids have a mobile phone in their pocket, I remember & I have posted same before being the only home in our street that had a telephone connected, we have all certainly lived thru a great upgrade in communication technology.
My sister as a young girl worked at the telephone exchange in Sydney.

When we rang Nanna & Grandad from a public phone box (remember them) we had to ring the people 5 houses down because they were the only ones with a telephone anywhere close. Ring person to person and they have to send one of the kids as a runner to get nanna to come down and take the call. I remember dad saying it cost more to ring nanna than it cost in fuel to drive there and back to Wollongong ..... times certainly have changed for the better as far as that goes as well .... the cost of the phone call, not the cost of fuel

T1 Terry

[pet-els]

Back in 1942, my father after being pensioned off from the army, he had 20 chooks in the back yard. So he applied for a phone as he was a "Primary Producer", all he needed the phone for was to put his bets on on the races on a Saturday, One shilling each way on the favorite at the SP bookie. We were not allowed to use it or listen to the wireless on a Saturday.
Then sold the eggs in the Central hotel in York st Sydney on the black market.

PeterH

[Shirley]

Peter, Bruce is always telling me about the products that were very hard to buy/find that were exchanged or sold on the black market in those days, I'm not quite that old. he tells me all the time if I complain about anything, " wait till you're my age."

[Greynomad]

T1,
I also had an Ericofon with the dial in the base.
It was THE phone to have in the late 60s~early 70s!
If you needed to leave the call on hold you just laid it on its side...