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First Phone Book Had 50 Listings, No Numbers


Claire.

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The First Telephone Book Had Fifty Listings and No Numbers

We know exactly when the now-defunct expression “I’m in the book” became a saying: 1878. Since the advent of the internet, the print phone book has largely become an artifact of a past age. At least one city has attempted to ban the phone book’s yellow pages on environmental grounds. But in February 1878, the phone book was cutting-edge technology.

First published on this day in 1878, the telephone directory widely considered to be the absolute first phone book was nothing but a sheet of cardboard with the names of both private people and businesses who had a telephone.

The fact that there were 50 people to call in New Haven, Connecticut in 1878 definitely had something to do with the fact that the telephone was invented near there less than two years previously and was first demonstrated by inventor Alexander Graham Bell in New Haven.  

Read more: Smithsonian.com

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Our telephone books end up in the recycle bin, unused and unopened.

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I haven't had landline for so long I never get phone books anymore.

But I do remember when I first saw my name in the book..."I've finally arrived! I'm somebody!" :lol:

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