Number please … Shelter Island’s evolving phone system

An important milestone was passed 50 years ago when, on May 1, 1966, the New York Telephone Company switched the Island’s 1,177 customers over to self-dial service.

Until then, Islanders making calls picked up the receiver in their home and waited for the operator to say, “Number please.”

Island operators, who worked in long shifts out of a central switchboard housed in the phone company’s Grand Avenue building, were the last in New York state to provide such service, along with their counterparts in Greenport and Orient. The changeover to “automated dialing” here was the company’s final phaseout of manual switchboards.

It was the second time the Island’s phone system made history; Long Island’s last magneto switchboard, in place here since phone service began on the Island in 1897, was removed in 1948. Prior to that change, those making calls had to pick up the receiver and then crank the magneto handle to provide enough current to power the phone’s transmitter and get the attention of the operator.

“Shelter Island’s new common battery equipment enables the subscriber to signal the operator merely by lifting the telephone from its cradle, “ L.E. Hoyt, the local phone company manager at the time, said in a announcement carried on the front page of The Long Island Traveller-Mattituck Watchman.

The adoption of automated dialing prompted the development a few years later of the Shelter Island Reporter Phone Book.

While a directory could not replace the personal attention of an operator, it became an important resource for Islanders and visitors to stay in touch. To keep the phone book current, we have annually posted notices in the paper asking people to submit changes, additions or deletions.

This type of crowdsourcing has its limitations — people who leave the Island, for instance, might not remember to cancel their listing — and so we end up with errors in the book. The new edition of this free book, supported by over 200 advertisers, will be appearing in your post office boxes soon (or can be picked up at the Reporter office beginning Tuesday May 24).

In recognition of 50 years of caller autonomy on Shelter Island, at a time when many Islander’s are giving up land lines in favor of mobile phones, we ask our readers to help us provide accurate, up-to-date contact information. If you have suggestions for the next edition of the book, you can reach us at 749-1000 or email phone book editor Julia Brennan at [email protected].