It’s funny to many of us who remember when we really did talk to a local telephone operator once in a while. Now, sadly, there’s no one manning the CenturyLink lines in Downtown Lorain.
(Strangely enough, I also remember party lines, dialing to get the time and temperature in Lorain, as well as calling Dial-A-Prayer just to see what we would hear.)
Apparently the days of using an operator to call Long Distance were numbered back in January 1971. The ad below, which ran in the Journal on January 30, 1971, encouraged Lorain Telephone customers to do it themselves by dialing direct.
The ad is somewhat provocative, with the face of the attractive woman who apparently is supposed to represent a telephone operator. I guess they wanted to get the reader’s attention (the men, anyway) before giving them the news that they should get used to doing it themselves – much like pumping gas and (today) ringing up your own purchases.
Maybe Lorain Telephone should have used its friendly anthropomorphic telephone mascot instead to deliver the message.
9 comments:
Hi Dan - Back in the 80's while working at The Journal, the phone co.(not sure what their name was then...(Centel?, Century? etc) was my account and they ran some ads for a new fangled service called "voice-mail". While we were discussing the ad content I remember thinking this was way out there and no one will use this...kind of like bottled water. Todd
Hi Todd! That’s funny that you had a ringside seat from an advertising standpoint to watch the communication changes taking place to get us where we are today.
That reminds me of when the company I work for bought its first Mac for the art department. At the time we were still doing paste-up using drawing boards and assembling the various elements (type, position-only photos, logos, etc.) on illustration boards with instructions for the camera dept. indicated using overlays. The Art Director put the Mac on a desk and told us that it was going to replace our drawing boards. I remember we asked, “How?!?!?"
That's funny. I don't know anything about advertising, but I do remember the first time our company purchased a computer and software for drawing blueprints for manufacturing. Up until that point, the drawings were hand drawn with various drafting tools. It could take weeks to complete one drawing depending on the complexity. That little computer allowed us to complete multiple drawings in one day. I couldn't believe how easy it made the job. The advancements in technology during our lifetime has been nothing short of amazing if you stop and think about it. Jim
Well.. that's a very sad advertisement. :-(
The company that initially took over for Lorain Telephone was Centel; I remember writing a couple of witty letters to the Editor detailing their Keystone Kops approach to telecommunications.
Yes but with advancements in technology also come job losses.Or whatever jobs are left are low on the payscale....Take your example above.Instead of having a crew of draftsmen drawing diagrams and such it now could be done with 1 or 2 people on a computer.So maybe some progress isn't so good after all.
I respectively disagree about the job losses. Yes, his company needed less draftsmen, but the addition of technology jobs was far more than the loss of outdated jobs; and they pay well. Want proof? Unemployment was at a 60 year low before Covid-19. My company couldn't find people to fill high paying skilled positions. If anything, the real problem is a lack of skilled educated workers to fill high paying positions. Yes, there are plenty of low paying jobs, but there are plenty of good paying jobs for qualified folks.
60 year low unemployment before Covid-19 . Wow, I must have missed Lorain county manufacturers hiring fairs for Ford, US Steel, Shipyards, Lorain Products, Moen, York, General Motors, National Gypsum, 3M. Maybe they will hire again after covid.
You must be one of those unskilled workers he was talking about. Those companies are all "has-beens" or out of business. You do realize that you can leave Lorain to get a job right? Stop complaining and blaming everybody else. Life is too short.
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