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Irte Arey * district going dial in December A conversation was carried on between London and Ottawa on an allâ€"Canadian line; the first telephone connection between Canaâ€" da and Europe was completed; communicaâ€" tion was first held to and from a moving train, a Canadian National train out of Toâ€" ronto; and a service was inaugurated with a number of large ships at sea. own gg, . ; _ _ ~~Mange, part of the Blanâ€" shard Municipal Telephone System, will be moved from Mrs. Munro‘s house to a modâ€" ern building under construction in Uniondale. Mrs. Munro will retire on that date and the board that had become so much a part of the community‘s life will serve no longer. ‘"‘Have I haqd funny experiences in my 46 years?" Mrs, Munro repeats the question_as memories of her years of public service flash in her mind. ‘"One winter, I think it was 1928, we had a big snowstorm. Thelines were down beâ€" tween here and St. Marys and there was a woman in Uniondale expecting a baby. Her husband walked down hers (4a Aictsaan af On June 13, 1929, the Westem Counties Telephone Association met at the Hotel Lonâ€" don to discuss fche development of the phone. The year 1929 was memorable in the histoâ€" ry of telephone development. According to that day‘s Free Press, about 200 members, "representing nearly every section of Western Ontario," attended the meeting and were welcomed by Mayor W. J. Kilpatrick. In 1970 the Canadian Independent Teleâ€" phone Association had 124 members in Onâ€" tario and Quebec. es 4 _ the biggest problem that we have is with sweethearts and school children doing homeâ€" work, They sometimes tie up party lines fmj over an hour and we can only handle 15 calls at one time * This end, A new dial lines will go Customers v "Mert‘s" nny «wWhen ServiCe couldn‘t either a! panies O pHosl Aâ€" The mer, which tors‘ â€" The built _ 1902. in 1904 a NE XOC8 "0 C Augustine‘s office in Aylmer to wW. H. Baron‘s store at Mapleton. wourtorons what was Inown as the Aylmer Telephont Co, consisted of one lci;;Maplet()n telephones connected to it. Each phonwlth 4 coded ring. e had a The Aylmerâ€"Malahide Co. w . was formed i 1904 and had 48 subscribe Ee s rs and one employâ€" The old records of the co ) f m first year show that office andp:laf;z’riior th§ the company $150 and total disburs 4o4 for the year were around $212.63 ements Tn comparison, the com nds to the dial system in 1965 ie ioh 4 Rumber _op 30. _ TA one and twoâ€"party 168 will go into operation Dec. 1 and the istomers will _ be forced to remember Mert‘s" number, 2 se The Meding ‘oxomaraorn._ n apaes ((The time," bersonalizeq or Bellâ€"" & 1971 "CL, 1 1Nink it was 1928, we had a orm. The. lines were down beâ€" _and St. Marys and there was a Uniondale expecting a baby. Her system with one U 200 depression people had their ut and during the war the 1dn‘t get supplies and the he Telephone Service Comâ€" d with a small staff of enâ€" free advice to the small : to update their services. s began switching to dial the smaller companies make the switch and were y larger independent comâ€" system is PAGES 17 . 32 coming to an ‘‘The businessmen complained when the distinction was made between party lines and private ones. They didn‘t like the rate increase. What the company did was to put all butchers on one party line, all restaurants on another and so on. It wasn‘t long before. they came around and got their private lines." Ralph E. E. Scott remained as manager of the exchange until June, 1913. Under the agreement he had to provide out of his salary "the necessary operating staff messenger service (maintained by phone companies to deliver messages to nonâ€"subâ€" scribers), office space and accommodation properly lighted and heated." The costs of converting to dial systems have driven many small companies out of business. The Allenford Rural Telephone Co. Ltd. sold out to Bell this year when the estimated cost of conversion for the 252â€"phone system was $320,000. Ernie Pringle, secretaryâ€"manager of the company said: ‘"We just couldn‘t afford to do it. We are just in the process of taking all our old lines down . . . that should take about two months." The trend from the highly personalized system of the magneto phone era will be reâ€" placed by the streamlined automation of the dial system, but not without a price. They presently have 2,482 subscribers with exchanges at Forest, Arkona and Aberarder. According to the last report by the Teleâ€" phone Service Commission, 12 companies were taken over by Bell in 1970, seven are scheduled to be taken over this year and in 1972 two more are planning to sell. The larger independents, such as the Northern Telephone Ltd., of New Liskeard, with 46,583 phones, are thriving. The 1970 report shows the company, with 5,589 subscribers, had a net profit of $60,000. Their 9,000 square foot, $90,000 head office on Sydenham St., is a far cry from their humble beginnings in the back of a doctor‘s office. The People‘s Telephone Co., of Forest, beâ€" gan in 1891 in the back of Ralph E. Scott‘s drugstore on King St. The first listing for the Forest Exchange, was in the December, 1891, telephone direcâ€" tory for Western Ontario. Among the 34 subscribers were Alexander and Pickering, veterinary surgeons; two livâ€" ery stables; two hotels; J. N. Dillon Grocerâ€" ies, Boots and Shoes on King St.; and the ofâ€" fice of Dr. R. Owens. The actual company was formed in 1906 with headquarters at Forest. G. E. MciIntosh was named secretary. In 1915 the Forest company bought out the local Bell Telephone Co. exchange to become the lone area company. â€" Roger Sutherland, the assistant manager of the company, said that early in the comâ€" pany‘s history it faced a crisis which nearly wiped it out. August rate increases bring the company‘s rates equal to Bell Telephone‘s, Mr. Sutherâ€" land said. The independent company coâ€"ordinator for Bell Telephone Co., J. R. B. Scott, said: ‘‘Many small services fold because they can‘t afford to modernize. We look at their assets and, in a case like the Allenford Co. we sometimes pay the company to remove itsâ€"old lines." Scheduled to be taken over later this year by Bell is the Herron Private Telephone Sysâ€" tem in Northern Ontario which has only one phone. It is owned by Marie H. Storie and was built by her uncle about 70 years ago so his lumber mill would not have to share a party line with 23 other subscribers. Most of the takeovers in the past few years have involved marginal companies, each with 100 phones or less. . . While the number of companies in Ontario has decreased from 465 in 1954 to the present 49, the number of phones serviced by indeâ€" pendent companies has increased slightly to around 185,000. No longer will you be able to ask the operâ€" ator to "get me Mert." The company cut over to dial operations in 1964. He was replaced by R. B. Crosbie, a book seller, and the exchange was moved into his store. In return for a $35 a month salary Mr. Crosbie was to provide service from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. on weekdays, 2 to 4 p.m. on Sunâ€" days, 10 to 12 a.m. and 2 to 4 p.m. on holiâ€" days.