Partyline numbers??

Question

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Answer 1

IThat goes back to years ago when we had party lines.  What part of the world are you in?

Answer 2

There were many different arrangements for party lines at different times and in different places.

The most basic arrangement was a 2-way party line with fully selective ringing.  That meant that although you could always hear any conversation taking place on the line when you picked up, your phone would only ever ring for your own calls, not for the other party.    

Then you could get 4-party service with either fully selective or partially selective ringing.   Partially selective means that you would hear the ringing for SOME other people besides yourself, but not all.   With 4-way partially selective you would hear the ringing for one other person besides yourself, but not for the other two.

Larger party lines were built up with combinations of selective ringing and all sorts of combinations of short and long rings.  10-way party lines weren't uncommon in rural areas of the U.S. at one time, so you might have ringing codes such as long, short-short, long-short, long-long, and so on.  There were even a few places where 20-way party lines were employed!

Numbering varied.   Some systems, including almost all simple 2-way systems allowed any combination of local numbers to be assigned to different parties on the line.  Other systems grouped them together.  For example, in the 10-way system used in many areas everybody on the same party line had the same phone number except for the last digit.  So if your number was 2891, then the other people on your line would be 2892, 2893, 2894, etc.  The last digit simply determined which ringing code was applied to the line.  People on a private line would always have a number ending in "1" with the remaining nine numbers of that group being unused.

Because it's impossible to call somebody on the same party line as yourself in the normal way (the line is busy, because you're using it!), there were often special codes to dial so you could hang up and then wait while the line was rung.

Party lines go right back to the days of manual service (as in when you just picked up the phone and an operator would answer: "Number please?").    In the Bell System, a common 4-way arrangement used the letters J, M, R, and W to identify the different parties on the line.   So if your number was 372-M, then the three other people sharing your line would have been 372-J, 372-R and 372-W.   When anyone called any of those numbers the operator would just plug into her jack for line 372, then operate keys to apply whatever was the correct ringing for J, M, R, or W.

Here in the relatively compact U.K. huge multi-way party lines weren't as necessary and were rare, except in the most remote areas, but the basic 2-way automatic party line was in use until the 1980s.

Answer 3

Years ago, in the new industry of phone communications, there was limited amounts of wire, especially in rural areas.  Phone companies offered "party lines" as basic service.  Each user had a ring cadence that identified whether the call was for the, or for a neighbor.  For instance, when I was a kid, ours was 2 short rings, but our neighbor was 1 long ring.  Another neighbor was 1 long ring and 1 short ring.  If we heard a "ring-ring" we would answer.  If we heard a "riiiiiiing-ring", we wouldn't.

Because "party lines" were shared cables, often we would pick up the phone to make a call and hear a neighbor talking on the line already.  We would hang up and wait our turn later.

In time, technology changed somewhat.  We got a singular "ring" that rang only our phones, although still a shared cable.  If already in use, we would hear a neighbor conversing.

It was several years, but eventually "private lines" became the norm as larger capacity cables were designed and placed throughout the area.   Now, all services are "private" unless there is a fault in the cable or wiring.

Answer 4

You might be referring to the extension lines? They normally use 3 or 4 digit numbers.