How We Made Long-Distance Calls (and Why We Waited Until After Dinner)

Somebody shouted it from the kitchen: "It's long distance!"

Everyone came running. Grandma was on the line from three states away, and you each got a turn, about a minute apiece. Say hi, say thank you for the birthday card, say you're doing good in school, pass the phone. And the whole time, someone was looking at the kitchen clock.

Long distance cost real money, and every minute counted.

Nostalgia Responsive Ad Unit #1

The Tools

The phone on the kitchen wall, usually with the longest cord anyone could buy, so it could reach around the corner for a little privacy.

The front pages of the phone book, which listed long-distance rates and the hours when calls were cheaper.

The operator, for any call that needed help.

The kitchen clock or an egg timer, for keeping it short.

High-CPM Native Sponsorship Unit #2

The Kinds of Calls

Station-to-station. You called a number and talked to whoever answered. This was the cheaper kind. By the 1960s, more and more people could dial these calls themselves.

Person-to-person. You told the operator exactly who you wanted to speak to. If that person wasn't there, you didn't pay. It cost more, and by 1981, AT&T was adding a $3 surcharge for every person-to-person call, according to The Washington Post.

Collect calls. The person you called agreed to pay. This was the call every college student and teenager at a pay phone knew by heart.

Why We Waited Until After Dinner

Long-distance prices depended on when you called. Daytime on weekdays, when businesses used the lines, was the most expensive.

According to FCC records, AT&T's rate schedule from March 1975 set up three periods: day, evening, and night. Evening calls got a 35 percent discount, and night calls got 60 percent off. Weekends and holidays were often discounted too, which is why so many families saved their calls for Sunday.

So the plan in a lot of houses was simple: wait until the rates dropped, then call.

Step by Step

**Check the clock.** Is it the cheap time yet?
**Dial 1, then the area code, then the number.** (Before direct dialing reached your area, you called the operator instead.)
**Talk fast.** Get the news out first: who's sick, who's coming for the holidays, who had the baby.
**Pass the phone.** Every kid gets a turn.
**Wrap it up.** "Well, this is costing you money..." was how a lot of calls ended.
**Wait for the bill.** Long-distance calls showed up itemized on the monthly phone bill, and someone always asked, "Who called Ohio for 40 minutes?"

The Tricks People Knew

Many families had a quick signal for "we got there safely": a call that rang a set number of times and then hung up, so nobody had to answer and nobody had to pay. Letters still did a lot of the heavy lifting, too. You wrote the long news and saved the phone for the short, important stuff.

What Was Actually Better

A call was an event. When the phone rang on a Sunday night and it was family far away, the whole house stopped. People got good at saying what mattered in a few minutes.

What We Don't Miss

The bill. The feeling that every minute of laughing with your sister was costing money. And trying to have a private conversation with a cord that only reached as far as the pantry.

Why It Changed

Competition came after the breakup of the Bell System in 1984, and long-distance prices began to fall. Then cell phone plans arrived with "free nights and weekends," and finally plans where long distance stopped meaning anything at all. Today, calling across the country costs the same as calling next door.

Who did your family call long distance, and who watched the clock?

Sources

*Reference Book of Rates, Price Indices, and Expenditures for Telephone Service*, FCC
"AT&T to Raise Long-Distance Phone Rates," *The Washington Post*, Dec. 4, 1981
Pacific Telephone directory rate pages, San Francisco, 1970 (San Francisco Genealogy library)
FCC tariff decision on AT&T rates, 1971