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Landlines: On life support?

NEW BIG BOARD: Dewitt E. Wallace, president of the Old National bank, and Mrs. Margaret Jones, chief switchboard operator, look over the new switchboard which, starting tomorrow, will serve all of the more than 200 telephones in the bank's eight Spokane branches. Said to be the largest semiautomatic dial system of its type in Spokane, the board makes it possible to reach any individual in any of the bank's Spokane offices by dialing the main office number. Until now, each branch has had its own telephone number. The board was installed by Pacific Telephone company. Photo Archive/ The Spokesman-Review. (The Spokesman-Review)
Rebecca Nappi
NEW BIG BOARD: Dewitt E. Wallace, president of the Old National bank, and Mrs. Margaret Jones, chief switchboard operator, look over the new switchboard which, starting tomorrow, will serve all of the more than 200 telephones in the bank's eight Spokane branches. Said to be the largest semiautomatic dial system of its type in Spokane, the board makes it possible to reach any individual in any of the bank's Spokane offices by dialing the main office number. Until now, each branch has had its own telephone number. The board was installed by Pacific Telephone company. Photo Archive/ The Spokesman-Review. (The Spokesman-Review)
NEW BIG BOARD: Dewitt E. Wallace, president of the Old National bank, and Mrs. Margaret Jones, chief switchboard operator, look over the new switchboard which, starting tomorrow, will serve all of the more than 200 telephones in the bank's eight Spokane branches. Said to be the largest semiautomatic dial system of its type in Spokane, the board makes it possible to reach any individual in any of the bank's Spokane offices by dialing the main office number. Until now, each branch has had its own telephone number. The board was installed by Pacific Telephone company. Photo Archive/ The Spokesman-Review. (The Spokesman-Review)

Fresh from the U.S. Census today:

The percentage of households with a microwave climbed from 82 percent in 1992 to 97 percent in 2011. Similarly, the percentage with a computer jumped from 21 percent to 78 percent over the period. Landline phones followed the opposite trend; the share of households with landlines fell from 96 percent in 1998 to 71 percent in 2011.

(S-R archive photo of switchboard operators)

* This story was originally published as a post from the blog "EndNotes." Read all stories from this blog