While Reddy Kilowatt (with more than 50 blog posts devoted to him) is a favorite, I'm also a fan of the one I loosely refer to as "That Telephone Guy" (shown above). He seemed to have originally been a creation of the Bell Telephone System in the 1930s, and proceeded to be featured in a series of Bell ads that ran all the way up to the early 1950s.
Later, some local phone companies (like Lorain Telephone) used a simplified version of the character on customer billing paperwork, and in their own advertisements.
Here's an example of one of those ads. It ran in the Lorain Journal back on October 13, 1953. I like the way the couple is walking hand-in-hand with the oversized Telephone Guy. Just another everyday occurrence in Anytown, USA.
The ad does have some helpful hints about keeping the phone away from a damp environment, including using a wall phone. I wonder if wall jacks are still an option in today's construction?
I had a wall jack in my condo. But at some point, a previous owner covered it up. You can see the lump on the wall where it's been imprisoned forever. But that's okay. My condo still had a few phone jacks that were in use up until a few months ago, when I finally got rid of my land line. I think I was the last person in Ohio with one.
Sorry, Telephone Guy.
