The Telephone — The Operator Wants to Connect You

1907

What It Means When the Operator Announces "Line Busy."

It is easier for an operator to establish a connection than reply, "Line busy." Recollection of this simple fact may perhaps smooth out the asperities of a state of mind evoked by a hasty conclusion that the operator simply is shirking.

Follow a call into the main exchange, for example. You ask for a certain number. The operator immediately informs you the line is busy. How does she know? Simply by a little admonitory click in the receiver when she tries to "plug in" on the line asked for. She cannot tell you who is talking on the line, how long it has been in use or how long it is likely to be "busy." All the information she possesses is a click, but it is sufficient to advise her that some one of the 150 other operators in the exchange had a prior call from or to that number. Had the line been clear the effort to complete the connection would have been no greater than that required to get the click; hence the task of informing a caller that the line is busy is just so much extra labor — in fact, it involves a double burden, as the subscriber will usually repeat the call until he is able to transact his business.

Obviously, therefore, the desire of the operator is to establish the connection when it is first called for. She has no motive in doing otherwise. — Telephone Talk.

Man's Tomato Vines Resemble Jack's Bean Stalk

Irvington, Indiana, 1918

WHAT MIGHT HE HAVE DONE HAD HE KNOWN TOMATOES?

Although a Novice, W. M. Young Declares Vines Resembled "Jack's Bean Stalk"

W. M. Young, 28 Colorado avenue, Irvington, is wondering how large a tomato crop in the rear of his home would have been last summer had he been an expert agriculturist rather than a novice at the game.

Young, who is a busy man as traffic manager for the Nordyke & Marmon automobile and milling machine plant, sought some pastime as a relief from his "grind" at the office — a regular "nightmare" of less than car loads, differentials, freight tariffs, lost shipments and overcharges.

A kind neighbor found a solution. It was gardening. Tomato seeds were supplied and early last spring Young got busy with the spade. He kept busy and cared for the tender plants in the same gentle manner that an experienced farmer does his crops.

The vines continued to grow until they took on astounding proportions. Some of the vines climbed to a height of six feet, and Young says some of the tomatoes were "nearly" as large as red toy balloons. The season's yield from twenty-one vines was six bushels.

Young is planning to establish even a better record next summer and his entire back yard will be transformed into a garden for the exclusive development of a tomato crop.

—The Indianapolis Sunday Star, Indianapolis, November 23, 1918, page 4.