Cultural Analysis- 1963

     On November 18, 1963 Bell Telephone introduced the first push button telephone or dual tone multi- frequency phone (also referred as a touch tone telephone).  This new phone had all the numbers on it accept for the pound and star key.  It took an additional five years for the pound and star to be added.  Henry Dryfus who was a consultant working for Bell Telephone is credited with this invention.  The phone was called the Western Electric 1500.  This was released in late 1963 into 1964.  This replaced the rotary telephone that had been out since 1891 when Almon Strowger invented it.

     The design of the phone is simple.  It is a square with the phone that sits on the top horizontally.  The keys are located on the base on a slight angle.  The keys are number zero to nine are four rows in a row starting with one.  Zero is on the fourth row in the center.  The first model of the push button was a square wooden block.  Rotary phone were circular.  Henry Dryfus wanted people to be able to distinguish between the two.
The main advantage to this phone was that the touch pad cut the dialing time down from ten seconds on a rotary phone to five seconds.  Many business owners though that this was a good investment because it saved time. 

  
      The first of the touch tone services was in Greensburg and Carnegie, Pennsylvania.  In 1963, only eighty three percent of the United States population had a telephone in their home.  The phones were selling for around fifty dollars, give or take a few dollars.  The upper class and businesses were the first to have these phones because of the price.  Another way to have a phone at this time was to have phone service with a leased phone.  This only cost about ten dollars a month for monthly service. 

     This product was marketed through newspapers and TV commercials.  Here is an example of a commercial from youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5t5na44D0Dw&feature=PlayList&p=53447DCAC122AD4D&playnext=1&index=8

(the picture on the left is from a newspaper back in 1963)

Suggestions for further reading

AT&T, 2009, 'Milestones in AT&T History', http://www.corp.att.com/history/milestone_1963.html
     This website gives some detailed information about the history of the telephone.  It starts from the           invention of the first telephone, all the way up to 2006.  On the opening page, it has a picture of what the original touch tone looks like. 

Rogers, Tom. You and Your Telephone. Washington D.C.: Stationery Office, The, 1980.
     This book gave good information on the rotary phone and also the touch tone telephone along with pictures (pages 29- 32).