This day in Mohawk Valley history: January 19, 1927
The Freeman’s Journal, January 19, 1927, Cooperstown, Otsego County, NY
Hello, London!
Are You There?
If You Want To Talk By Radio
Simply Call Long Distance
Who wants to talk with London? It is easy to do so. Just call long distance and give the name and address or the London number and the connection will be given you. The price is only a mere bagatelle, just a paltry seventy-five dollars for three minutes and twenty-five dollars for each additional minute or fraction thereof, with a limit of twelve minutes when other calls are waiting for connection. There will be a report charge of ten dollars in case the telephone is reached but not the designated party.
Owing to the fact that communication from New York is by radio privacy cannot be assured, although work is in progress to insure a higher degree of privacy in the future.
Announcement to the above effect was made last week by General Manager Fluhrer of the Otsego & Delaware company, he having received advice that arrangements have been made by the New York Telephone and Telegraph company and the British post office to extend the Trans-Atlantice radio telephone service so that telephones in New York State connected with their lines can be connected with phones in the metropolitan area in London.
This service opened at 8:30 a.m., Saturday, January 15th, and will be available thereafter daily between 8:30 a.m. and 1 p.m., New York time. These hours correspond to 1:30 p.m. and 6 p.m. London time.
Split second watches will be used at the switchboard to record the exact time of filing application for connection.
NOTE: Placing a 3-minute call to London based on the value of $25 in 1927 as compared to today would cost $1,279.30. Each additional minute would cost $426.43. A call from Cooperstown, NY, to London limited to 12 minutes would cost the caller $5,117.17.
Source:https://nyshistoricnewspapers.org/lccn/sn83031249/1927-01-19/ed-1/seq-1/
