Widow Rented Rotary Phone For 42 Years

[matcom]

<snip>

CANTON, Ohio --A widow rented a rotary dial telephone for 42 years, paying what her family calculates as more than $14,000 for a now outdated phone.

Ester Strogen, 82, of Canton, first leased two black rotary phones -- the kind whose round dial is moved manually with your finger -- in the 1960s. Back then, the technology was new and owning telephones was unaffordable for most people.

Until two months ago, Strogen was still paying AT&T to use the phones -- $29.10 a month. Strogen's granddaughters, Melissa Howell and Barb Gordon, ended the arrangement when they discovered the bills.

"I'm outraged," Gordon said. "It made me so mad. It's ridiculous. If my own grandmother was doing it, how many other people are?"

New Jersey-based Lucent Technologies, a spinoff of AT&T that manages the residential leasing service, said customers were given the choice option to opt out of renting in 1985. The number of customers leasing phones dropped from 40 million nationwide to about 750,000 today, he said.

"We will continue to lease sets as long as there is a demand for them," Skalko said.

Benefits of leasing include free replacements and the option of switching to newer models, he said.

Gordon said she believes the majority of people leasing are elderly and may not realize they are paying thousands of dollars for a telephone.

Skalko said bills are clearly marked, and customers can quit their lease any time by returning their phones.

Strogen says she's not a big fan of her new push-button phone.

"I'd like to have my rotary back," she said. "I like that better."

http://www.boston.com/news/odd/articles/2006/09/14/widow_rented_rotary_phone_for_42_years?mode=PF

[billyskank]

1. BT asked me if I wanted to rent a phone when I first moved out

"It's only £11 a year," they said.

:wtf: "It only costs £15 to buy!" said I. :crazy:

[Love Bug]

2. The fact they have to explain what a rotary phone is makes me feel older

than dirt. x(

[azmouse]

23. I feel that way too!

sheesh... it hasn't been THAT long since they were in use that people wouldn't know what they are!

[One_Life_To_Give]

3. For some it's simpler

The older generations were not comfortable converting to customer owned phones/wiring. For them it was simpler to pay the rental than worry when the phone stops working properly, is it my equipment or the phone company? Who do I call to repair my non-phone company equipment etc.

[PeterPuck]

4. at $29 a month??

Who cares if your non-phone company phone stops working. Throw it out and buy a new one for half that cost.

My parents had this same thing back in the 80s... early 90s. They thought they had to rent at least one phone from the phone company as part of the service. The one they had was not rotary though. When I became aware of it, I got them to cancel the rental.

Funny thing is that the phone company doesn't even want the old phones returned. They just stop charging you.

[Xithras]

11. Show me where you can buy a NEW rotary at that price.

I don't think anyone has manufactured them in about 30 years. If you prefer rotaries, these rental programs are about the only way to go.

FWIW, I think rotaries are cool. Every once in a great while I'll end up in some backwater place where the only phone is an ancient rotary, and dialing them always takes me back to being a kid. Ziip, Bzzzzzt. Ziiiiiip, Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzt. Zip, Bzzt. Ziiiiiip, Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzt. Too cool :)

Of course, I felt REALLY old when my grandfather died and I inherited that phone (as you said, the phone company didn't want it back). I wired it up in my garage because I needed one out there and I thought it would be an interesting way to remember him. My kids, who were born in the age of the Internet and have always lived in a tech-heavy home, had no clue how a rotary dial phone worked. My 10 year old daughter kept touching the numbers through the holes, assuming it was touch sensitive like her iPod. When I showed them that you had to SPIN the wheel, they both agreed that it was the dumbest thing they'd ever seen. Kids. :eyes:

[Lochloosa]

20. Here you go...

http://www.rotarydialphones.com/black500new.htm



Brand new, mint condition model 500 phone

Rings and dials like new

Made years ago in the USA, but never used

Still in original box!

Ready to use - retrofitted to work in your standard phone jack

Ringer volume control on bottom of the phone

Includes blank center dial label so that you can write in your own phone number

Will work during power outages

Looks like Carrie's phone from Sex in the City

Satisfaction guaranteed

Delivery in 2-7 days for most of the continental USA.

[Xithras]

27. OMG!!!!! Too cool! And $60 is a good price

I REALLY wish stuff like this had existed when my grandfather was alive, we could have saved him a LOT of money on phone rentals. Before the Internet, you couldn't buy it if it wasn't sold in a store or through a catalog.

[Fenris]

5. Heh. Ester Strogen

E. Strogen. :rofl:

[Heidi]

6. I'm going to get my rusty shovel

so that I can spank you with it. :spank:

:rofl:

[Fenris]

7. It's a legitimate observation.

How often do you see names like that? :rofl:

[underpants]

8. Was she still breastfeeding it?

[Xithras]

9. "I'd like to have my rotary back"

That pretty much says it all...the womans granddaughters should have butted out. My grandfather, to the day he died, would only use rotary phones. He liked the tactile feedback of the rotaries, and the fact that it's MUCH easier to catch misdialed numbers on a rotary phone. The BELLS in the old rotaries were also much louder than the electronic beeping in modern phones, and he could hear it better once his hearing started to wane. Like this lady, he paid Pacific Bell every month to lease that phone.

When we tried to push him to quit wasting his money, his reply was simple: "Find me a new rotary phone to replace this with, and I'll give it up". We never did, so neither did he.

It is NOT a waste of money if you are being provided with a service that you cannot get anywhere else. This lady's grandkids may have just saved her some money, but in exchange she's now stuck with a telephone and service that she doesn't like. How does that benefit her?

[The Straight Story]

12. Here are some for sale

http://www.boldoldphones.com/

[Xithras]

21. Cool. Places like that didn't exist pre-Internet.

I do have to point out that those aren't NEW phones though...they're old phones that have been sitting in storage for twenty-plus years. I looked that site over, and it makes no claims that the phones have been rebuilt or even cleaned. The mouthpieces on the old rotaries had lots of holes in them, and tended to collect spit and all kinds of goo inside of them over time. There is NO WAY I'd use somebody elses old rotary without having it rebuilt and sterilized first.

I remember that back in the early 80's there used to be all kinds of stories (not sure how true) of people catching diseases from these old things. Whether true or not, when you grow up hearing those stories you tend to develop certain "phobias". Used telephones were considered unclean and disgusting, and that's why my grandfather (and other elderly people who hang onto their rotaries) insist on NEW replacements.

[The Straight Story]

26. You can even get a rotary cell phone now! check it out:

http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/product_info.php?products_id=286

[Xithras]

30. ROFL!

:wow:

It's gotta be a pain in the ass fitting that thing in your pocket!

[ronnykmarshall]

15. They should get her one from E-bay.

You can find a good rotary phone there pretty cheap.

I LOVE the old rotary phones too.

I had two. One "I Love Lucy" phone (from the 50's) and a white princes model. I gave the Lucy phone to my step mom and the princess to my friend Deb.

I always keep one land-line (non-cordless)phone hooked up. I currently have a snappy little brown trim-line (touch tone however).

[The Straight Story]

16. $35 from the site above for one, heck I may buy one now :) (nt)

[ronnykmarshall]

24. I just put in a bid on this little beauty.

[ronnykmarshall]

33. OK ..... which one of you out bid me??

Oh, it's ON now!

[Xithras]

17. You'll pay $20-$30 for one off E-Bay

AND you'll still have to find an electronics guy who's been around long enough to remember how to repair them (the ones on E-Bay typically haven't been rebuilt...there are contacts in the old rotaries that wear out over time). Most repair guys nowadays are going to charge you $50+ an hour to work on them.

[ronnykmarshall]

22. That's not true.

There a TONS of rotary phone for sell on e-bay and they are in great shape. I've purchased a few for my step-grandmother and one for me. But again these are touch tones.

[Xithras]

25. *sigh* See my #21 and...

And as for them being rebuilt, I know better. As I said in another post here, I have an old rotary wall phone hanging in my garage and still use it to this day. There are a series of contact switches inside of them that DO carbon up and need rebuilding from time to time. On top of that, most of the phones you see for sale today have been sitting in boxes for the past twenty years and haven't seen any real maintenance since the 1970's. Since these contacts were made of copper or aluminum (depending on the age of the phone) they've almost always seen some corrosion from their long storage period. If you actually plan on using them, you need to have them disassembled and have the contact surfaces cleaned and/or rebuilt. They WILL work, but you'll have static, they won't always dial reliably, and your sound quality will be far lower than it could be. If your phones are working "well", you might want to consider having one rebuilt and see the difference. Depending on how well maintained your phones were, it can be huge.

It cost me about $60 to have my phone fully rebuilt last year, and the difference is night and day. My repair guy (a retired AT&T electrician who does this as a hobby business) explained all the ins and outs of the phone to me, and showed me exactly where and why they need maintenance.

[ronnykmarshall]

31. Oh ... ok.

Gotcha!!

[wildhorses]

10. for some odd reason your hot sauce bottle bothers me

in the most disturbing manner:evilgrin:














and I when I think about you I spank myself:spank:






























:rofl:

[billyskank]

14. WTF! WTF! WTF! WTF! WTF! WTF! WTF!

Never mind. :P

[wildhorses]

18. oh billyskank...

perhaps I or matcom should pm you....



matcom...would you like to have the honor?



of course there are others on here that were privy to the original conversation that started it all in the way back when and oh soooo long ago....

[matcom]

28. need help with that?

:rofl:

[Lydia Leftcoast]

13. Rotary phones were not a "new technology" in the 1960s

I remember the early 1950s, and they were definitely around then.

What was new technology in the 1960s was direct long-distance dialing.

[Zomby Woof]

19. I had a rotary phone all the way through 1988

Part way through college, in fact. That fucker could wake me up better than an alarm. I recall that we owned two... mine was a desktop type, and we had a wall type in the kitchen.

</geezer

[last_texas_dem]

29. I like rotaries

We still have one in the kitchen at my house that we've continued to use simply because it hasn't died. It's pushing thirty years old. In that same amount of time we've been through probably a dozen different touch-tone phones that have bit the dust. Dialing on the rotary is much more fun; if it weren't for the calls that require touch-tone dialing that's the only kind of phone I'd want to use.

[BrotherBuzz]

32. I still have my Western Electric rotary phone the company lent me....

I don't think I ever rented it, nor did I ever purchase it. I think the company just lost interest in me and forgot about it. I signed up for rotary service to save a whopping 75¢ a month and used it for years after everyone else had gone to the digital stuff. On a lark, I plugged in a touch-tone phone and found it worked...so apparently they switched entirely over to it without telling me, yet I continues to receive the monthly discount until Pacific Telephone sold out to Pac-Bell, AT&T, or whatever it is today.