The Sauk Centre herald., 1927-07-28
People Of United States
Are the Telephone Users
Three Out of Every Eve in the
World Are in America-Some
Interesting Comparisons


Three out of every five tele-
phones in the world are in the
United States where the per cap
ita figure for telephone is nearly
10 times as great as for Europe
or for the entire world. Out of
a total of 27,7S3,963 telephones
in the world on January 1, 1926
the United States possessed 49,
935,918 telephones, 81 per cent;
Europe had 7,479,690 or 27 per
cent and the remaining IL per cent
were scattered over the globe in
Asia, Africa, Oceania, South
America and countries in North
America outside of the United
States.
During the year 1925, the num-
Der of telephones in the world in
creased by 1,727,465 or more than
per cent, number exceeding the
total number of telephones in the
whole world at the beginning of
the century. The figures used in
the foregoing statement are taken
from a recently published complia-
ton of telephone and telegraph
stations of the world. Because of
the time required to obtain author
itative data from the more distant
countries, the most recent date for
which comparable figures are
available is January 1, 1926. Since
this date, the United States has
added more than 100000 tele-
phones to its total.
It is interesting to note that out
of 1889, 800 telephones operated
by private companies throughout
the world, 16,935,918 were in the
United States and that the United
States had 1913 telephones per 100
population as compared with only
1.5 telephones per 100 population
in Europe where over 88 per cent
of the telephones were under gov
ernment ownership and operation.
Canada ranks next to the Unit
ed States in telephone development
with 1872 telephones per 100 OF
it's inhabitants. Other European
countries follow: Denmark and
New Zealand, 90; Sweden, 7.2
Norway, 6. 3; Australia 6. Ger,
many, Al; Great Britain and
Northern Ireland, 3; and France
1.8. Germany ranks next to the
United States in absolute number
of telephones with 2,588,O16. In
South America, Argentina led in
development with 1.9 telephones
per 100 population. In Asia the
majority of telephones are in ia
pan which had IL telephones per
100 inhabitants.
A notable feature of American
telephone development is the large
number of telephones to be found
in the smaller towns and rural dis
tricts. In communities under so,
900 population in the United
States there were 11.7 telephones
per 100 inhabitants. In Europe
telephones are concentrated in the
larger cities and rural development
is almost negligible. London has
more than one third of the tele-
phones in Great Britain and Paris
has more than one third of the
telephones in France.
Despite the wide distribution of
telephones in the United States,
American cities are much more
highly developed than comparable
| foreign cities. New York, on a
per capita basis, has nearly four
times as many telephones as Lon
don, nearly three times as many
as Paris and more than twice as
many as Berlin. New York &C
tually has more telephones than
all of Great Britain and Northern
Ireland. Chicago has more tele-
phones than France; San Fran
cisco. has more than Italy while
Omaha, with a population of only
223,0OO people, had about one
third as many telephones as the
whole of Russia with It's 100000
900 inhabitants.
Not only has the United States
more telephones than all the rest
of the world but Americans use
the telephone oftener than the in
habitants of any other country
There were 1876 telephone conver-
sations per capita in this country
in 1925 as compared to 135 for
Denmark, 107 for Norway, LOG for
| Sweden, 33 for Japan, 80 for Ger
many, rs for Great Britain and
| 20 for France. There were in the
United States during 1925, a to-
tai of 22,400,000,000 completed
conversations equivalent for one
every second for more than zoe
years.