Crank Wall Phone

Darren Wright

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Springfield, Missouri
Was doing some browsing at one of the local donation stores. I came across an old crank telephone. It appears to be white oak, has box joint corners, but is missing most of the internal components. Someone had built an extension for the back, not sure what the purpose was though. I removed it and replaced it with the original back, which was with it.

Anyone know if there are conversion kits for these to use with a modern phone system?
 

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You don't have an old one there that's for sure. I would say someone has taken out some of the parts and cobbled it together, but it doesn't look anything like the phones we used to use.

Now hold on you are probably saying, you are only 34 years old and even in Maine the dial phone replaced the hand crank prior to 1974.

Well that may be, but my Dad. my Grandmother and my Uncle had their own private phone line running between the houses. Its called Johnson Hill because we all live right here so it was only a phone system ½ mile long, but we would crank the phone and my Grandmother would answer into the 1990's. Or we would ring up my Uncle.

It was always a special treat, no matter the year to hear that old bell clang away, and as we got older it happened less frequently, but all the more special. It finally stopped because my Uncle moved to a new house, and the batteries got hard to get. Big 6 volt dry cell reverse polarity batteries aren't easy to find you know? We were probably the last family to use the old cranks, but did not even know it.

You guys are probably thinking...my goodness what's the next thing Travis is going to tell us, he had an outhouse too? Well sort of...but I'll save that for a discussion in the Construction Sub-Forum on bathroom remodels someday. :)
 
MY Gawd, I'm Old! We had one of those and by goylly my M-I-L still does (although not in use) and you can plug it in an use it to answer. :thumb:

did a quick Google for you and Be prepared to climb off that wallet as the mothpiece you are missing is a buck and a quarter ($125.00) but check it out...http://www.oldphoneman.com/PartsWoodWallPhones.htm
 
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Well thanks for the feedback guys. Bill that page you gave had some info I was looking for, looks like I can get a reproduction mouthpiece for $9.95, just wasn't sure of the size.

I figured it would be too much to try and restore the thing, that's why I was looking for a conversion kit. I think this thing will probably just be a wall decoration for me or someone on ebay though.

Thanks again,
 
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