It was along about that time the local phone system made another change.

The first phone I remember was almost like a piece of furniture. It was an oak box that was mounted to the our hall wall in the center of our house. On the right side was a little crank and on the left side was an earpiece. The part we spoke into was on a stalk protruding from its center. When I was small I had to stand in a chair in order to talk to anyone.

Then came a black apparatus with an ear and mouth-piece connected together that set in a slot with two little pins that sprung up when it was lifted and activated the phone when it was picked up. When we lifted it and put it to our ear the operator would say, “Number, please.”

We had a small phone book with all the phone numbers of the people in our area and we would give her the number of the person we wanted to speak to. She would plug some wires into the corresponding holes on a switchboard and connect us to the party we wanted to speak with.

Then came the age of the rotary dial phone. The phone company back out came to our house and switched out our phone with one that looked similar, except it had a little wheel with holes in it mounted to its front.

You would insert your index finger into a hole with the corresponding number you wanted recorded at the switchboard and spin the wheel clockwise until it reached a stop mounted on the lower right side of the wheel.

You could tell if the phone was working by lifting up the receiver and listening in the earpiece. It would make a humming sound that was called the dial tone.

Well, when they first switched out our phones the dial tone had not been activated. There was no humming sound. The operator would still come on the line and ask which number you needed.

When the man switched out our old phone for the new one he told us that on a certain date at 10 o’clock at night the dial tone would be activated and there would be no more operators. We would have to turn the little wheel on the top of the phone that he called a dial.

Looking back it was a precursor to self checkout- only instead of doing away with checkers they were doing away with operators.

We were all excited when the night finally arrived that they were going to activate the dial tone. All five of us were standing in the hall with my father holding up the phone receiver while we listened to absolutely nothing but dead silence.

Then at precisely 10 o’clock, it happened. We heard the dial tone coming through the receiver and we all began to cheer.

We had witnessed a modern marvel.

The next thing I knew, I was being promoted to the fourth grade. By the time I reached fourth grade word had gotten out. Watch out for the Algood kid. It was obvious, one of the kids was not like the others.

My fourth -grade teacher was known as the school witch. Every Halloween she dressed up as one and sat on her front porch beside a cauldron of steaming brew.

Actually, it was dry ice with a a dab of water to create the smoke effect. She would reach into the smoke, pull out candy and hand to the children that were lined up in front of her house.

Most kids learned quickly that the best street in town to hit for candy on Halloween night was South Columbus Avenue. There were a few wealthy families that lived there and they always had the best candy.

One old man was a widower and every Halloween he went to the bank to pick up $100 in silver dollars to hand out to the kids. You had to get there early because when they were all gone, he turned his porch light off and locked his door.

That being said , the old witch had been warned to keep an eye out for me. One day we all marched across the street to the junior high school for a special program. That wasn’t unusual. Sometimes it would be a traveling minstrel or a performer trying to make a buck by entertaining children. – An easy audience when you considered that we would have sat through anything to get out of class.

On that particular occasion, it was just after recess when they marched us over. All the boys had been outside playing football and were hot and sweaty. That year there was a cute little redhead that I fancied and we had planned to sit together during the program. My best friend was sitting on one side of me and she was on the other. Life was good.

My girlfriend looked at me and said, “Gee, Ricky you smell awful. I want to sit by him.”

Well, my buddy and I swapped places.

After a couple of minutes she said, “This is terrible! You smell worse than Ricky. Why don’t ya’ll swap places again.”

My buddy was tired of her antics and said, “Why don’t you just tell the teacher she stinks!” Then all three of us laughed.

Unbeknownst to us there was another fourth-grade teacher that was sitting behind us and she only heard part of our conversation. She thought she heard, Tell the teacher she stinks.

Later when we were back in our classroom the witch called all three of us out into the hall and informed us the other teacher had told her that we said she stank.

There was no convincing her that we hadn’t said that and we were confined to the classroom for all of the recesses the remainder of the year. Now that really stank!

(To be continued)

This was our first telephone. It was mounted on the wall in our hall and I had to stand in a chair in order to speak into the mouth piece.	Photo by Walter Bennett.
Photo by Walter Bennett.	Cotton wagons headed to a gin. Photo by Walter Bennett.
Unknown men. Photo by Walter Bennett.	The Masonic Temple in downtown Louisville. 1920s or 30s.
The Ford dealership in Louisville. To the left can be seen the Taft house. I believe a Western Auto Store is located there today.	WLSM's Chief engineer, Herb Guthrie.
Once Louisville's High School. By the time I attended classes in this building it was the Junior High. Behind the large windows on the left is the auditorium. Further back is the old section of the school that was built in 1908.	This is a program in the auditorium of the old high school. Note the backdrop someone was hand-painted.

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Rick Algood
September 1, 2021