Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-12-31
SPEED AND ACCURACY
Necessary in Compiling a
Telephone Directory.
MAKING THE CHANGES
RECORDING THE NAMES AND AD-
DRESSES OF SUBSCRIBERS.
Trained Experts Who Give Their Whole
Time to the Work-Guarding
Against Mistakes.
MAKING THE CHANGES

Another edition of the Washington tele-
phone directory is now on the presses. Big
publishing houses usually regard an edi-
ton Of 100000 or 100000 copies of book
in which extreme accuracy in matters of
typography is requisite as big undertake
ing, even when every line of the copy has
been written precisely as it is to stand be-
fore it goes to the printer. There are GER
tain books. however, that are continually
appearing in large and ever enlarging edi-
lions which are subject to almost innumer-
able revisions UP to the last moment be-
fore the forms locked and the great
pi esses begin to click them Off
These are the telephone directories-not
perhaps, literary productions of highest
merit. but presenting certainly the most
marvellous example of combined rapidity
and accuracy known to the publishing
world-a work which keeps presses running
twenty-four hours in the day for several
days before each issue. which depend upon
the most careful system in an industry
that owes its whole efficiency to system.
Getting out big editions of popular novels
or school Biographies is said to be mere
child S play compared with the task of is
suing telephone directories in our larger
centerS of population.
The necessity for extreme accuracy in
making subscribers books is apparent.
For many years the management of the
DSli SYSTEM. WHICH now IS up against the
work of providing books for nearly 2,OOO.-
oOo patrons. has been gradually building up
a comprehensive and thorough plan of
record. The result is that directories can
be issued In every center Of popula alton
with the finished workmanship which be-
lorgs to the higher forms of book pub
fishing and the inclusiveness that charac-
terizes the publication of daily newspapers.
Constantly Changing.
The telephone directory is, of course. a
particularly shifting compilation. A new
one is issued every three months. The
number of subscribers who have been en-
rolled in this period is sure to be large
for we are in the midst of an era of tele-
phone development. AT the same time some
subscribers have discontinued the service
and still others have had their telephone
station moved from one address to an
other. Firms and firm names are constant
~ altering. Furthermore extensive changes
must occasionally be made because of a re-
arrangement of lines and swtchboards
Finally, sometimes through the careless
ness of solicitor or other employee, but
more often through the bad handwriting of
a prospective subscriber mistake is made
in name which has to be altered in a
later edition.
AT the central Office of each of the large
companies one finds a department of cata-
loguing and publication, in which trained
experts give their whole time and attention
to bringing out the telephone books every
ninety days. This department is the clear
ing house for the business of whole dis
trict. Every subscriber in the territory is
represented. not only in the local and gen.
eral directories of the company, but also in
the great card catalogue which serves as
check upon the work of managers, COM
pliers and proofreaders. The expert cata-
loguers record the names and numbers of
new subscribers, change in numbers and
names and discontinuance Of service.
An Ingenious System.
That operators at local exchanges may be
Immediately informed of changes there is
an ingenious system by which the switch
board itself is made to give notice. Plugs
of nonconducting material and of different
colors when inserted in the switchsockets
on the face of the switchboard indicate to
the hello girls that telephones have been
discontinued, removed from one place to
another, or subjected to other changes In
the case of party lines, where several in
strumentS are connected with the same
pair of wires, it is, of course, impracticable
to use the plug which fills the switchsock-
et so there is employed in such instances
an equally ingenious system consisting of
dots of different colors. placed about the
socket Or jack those referring to the Diff
ent telephones on the line being in differ
ferent positions in reference to the switch
socket.
1t is obviously impossible to keen every
operator in central office informed Of
new numbers. but at the information desk
eDSiC al CdtdtOSueS ana INDEX books
which supply this information. When a
subscriber says he wants to talk with
John Doe or Richard Roe whose name is
not in the book, the operator puts him in
communication with the people at the in
formation desk, and they, with the rapidly
born of experience. find in their records
the desired number
Each manager of a telephone office re-
ports to the cataloguing department of the
company once a week all changes in the
list of subscribers, and for the correct
ness of such notifica lions he is held strict
ly responsible. The cards On which names
are written are required to be a model of
painstaking accuracy. About nothing are
people more particular-naturally enough
than about the spelling of their names.
Every effort has to be made to avoid
complaints and not to put the company to
the expense of unnecessary alterations,
After the card of notification has reached
the cataloguing department its contents are
recorded in the general card catalogue,