The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1883-10-22
THE TELEPHONE IN INDIANAPOLIS.

New Quarters-TeIephOne Rents Here and
EIsewhere-The Underground System.
"When will you get into your new quarters,
of OHIO and Illinois streets2" the reporter
inquired yesterday of Wiley Smith, electrician OF
the telephone service.
mot before tie holidays, Pm afraid. There's
a large amount of work to do, but we al
lowed all the money we ask to fit up Come and
see the rooms"
The Telephone Exchange will occupy the en-
tire third story of the building with its offices,
operating rooms, store rooms, ETC. One room is
set apart for the country lines. In the operating
room to be six switch-bOards, ar
ranged for 1900 wires. Three of the boards are
already up, but no WIRE connections have been
made. These wire connections will number "a,
600, and as the work of connecting them is deli
cate, and requiring time and care, ii will take
four or five weeks to do it. There are to be Two
women at each switchboard for day duty.
The number of operators to be required at night
Will be determined after trial OF the new sery-
ice.
"What pay do the women get9" asked the re-
porter.
"rwenty dollars month";" said Mr.. Smith;
"we have numerous applications, and could fill
up at $40 "A month l think the work will be
easier to manage in this place than it has been
in our present quarters. The advantage of this
new arrangement we are putting in Is that the
operator who gers your call follows 1t up and
makes the call and connection"
"How long before an underground system will
be adopted here?"
"Why, there is no underground system, so far,
that would work satisfactorily to patrons. The
sound OF the voice would be too faint, for dis
tances of more than half mile. You speak of
Paris. Well in Paris they run through sewers,
and those immense sewers are very different
from anything IN the way of underground work
in this country. What we might do would be
to join fifty wires into cable, and in
stead of stringing hundreds of wires on
high poles, put these cables on poles
say thirty feet high. In of fire the
wires could be more easily managed then
than now. You will see when we change to our
new place that we will relieve the business CEN
ter of the city of large number of poles and
wires. There will be great thinning out OF the
present netWOrk."
"How many country wires are running into
this city?"
Fifteen. Our longest wire ia from here to
Cincinnati, through Nashville and COnnersvllle,
125 miles. 1t is working fairly. LOng-distance
wires do not always work satisfactorily. Some
days they are all right, and then meteorological
changes will make them all wrong We think
we 90 more business over the wire TO Franklin
than any other town. Next TO Franklin, there
are several wires, Noblesvile Anderson, etc.,
that run about alike. We do not do much when
the wires get beyond forty or fifty miles long.
"But the exchange here does over $4,000 OF
business year2'
'No; not over &55, 900, think. A number of
the railroad telephones are not connected with
the exchange, and pay only slight rent. PeO-
pie think the rate high here, do they7 Well, in
New York city the RENTS $3.50 month, and
when used by other persons than the subscribers,
1922. so month. In Buffalo the charge is $50 a
year to a subscriber for 500 connections. If
there are more connections he has to pay addi-
tlonally. This city is pretty well scattered. We
have 600 miles of wire here. On our regular
payroll are fOrty-tive employees. We now have
fOrty-two extra employees, line men, etc. who
are taking down poles, cOiling wire, and doing
other work made necessary by our removal.
This work VIII continue for a long tlme and we
will not get down to our regular force again be-
fore March, 1884"