- Location
- Switzerland
- Name
- Matt
- Start Date
- Feb 15, 2023
- End Date
- Feb 21, 2023
Second half - game on!
M.
M.
Feb 17 outtake. My post in the main thread today was a view from my table at a local BBQ restaurant. Yes'm, camera in one hand, chicken sammich in the other. The place is huge (maybe 150-200+ tables) and has a collection of authentic vintage signs throughout. Hundreds and hundreds of signs collected by the original restaurant owner family over decades. This mirror thing appears to have come from some establishment (perhaps a train station) advertising businesses in the town of Madrid, Iowa. By the way, that would be pronounced "MAD-rid" here; nearby is also Nevada, Iowa, pronounced Nuh-VAY-duh). Not sure exactly what era this sign is from, but I'm guessing 1910s: the phone number for "Perrier Market Quality Meats" is simply "38" and "Central Cleaners" is "43." A quick google seems to indicate four-digit numbers came in to this region in about 1920.
View attachment 366702
This one was kind of fun in color, too:
View attachment 366704
Old Americana like this is cool and interesting. As well as different regional pronunciations of the same/ similar words.
Even though I'm a dinosaur not-a-dinosaur, I remember alpha-numeric phone numbers and party lines.
Glad you enjoyed it. Alpha-numeric numbers pre-date me a bit, but now I'm going to have Pennsylvania-six-five-oh-oh-oh stuck in my head all night![]()
KI7-xxxx was the first home phone number I remember, party line. We got a private line a few years later when our town got it's own exchange and the numbers went all numeric.
And there was always Junior Samples and his used car lot, Samples Sales, at BR-549.