Party Lines
Jan 20, 2024 by Nina Herschlikowitz Gabelko
Every day each of us is reminded of the importance of privacy—the need for it, the promise of providing privacy, and the breaches of it. My blog entry this week, unfortunately, focuses on how much joy my not-wealthy girlfriends and I got from breaching it. We got unending joy from listening in on “Party Lines.” Well-to-do families subscribed to the phone company for private lines—like now, when each line on your cellphone and your landline is securely yours. For example, I cannot lift my phone any time you’re on your phone on our common party line; I can just lift my receiver to listen in on your conversation from beginning to end. Of course, you were also able to listen in to my conversations but frankly, since my aunt and uncle snooped on everything I said to anyone, my phone conversations were never as interesting as the ones I listened in to. Those were wonderful.
Since, to the best of my knowledge the connection to others’ lines was by a random or some unknown rubric. First, I’ll disclose what I learned by snooping on others I didn’t know. Then, get ready for this... what can happen when random threatens to be disastrous; you cannot even imagine. Face it, you being so young just cuts you out of having heard of important things—like on party lines. Oh, and also how to keep yourself inaudible when you are snooping.
The problem to be avoided was that there was the telltale click your phone made when you lifted your phone, that could be heard by others already on the line. Since that could have resulted in the party already on the line yelling, “I know you’re there. Hang up your phone, you nasty snoop!” Ah, yes, but my crafty girl friends and I figured out how to prevent being caught by those we were listening on. If we unscrewed the mouthpiece on our phone while holding down the connection button on my phone, I would remain unclicked when I listened in.
When I lived on Durango, at the phone number Crestview72634, the party line person was a sort of hapless woman who was just about “d’ une certaine age” who just wasn’t clicking (pardon the pun) with potentially-potential spouses. Even then, I knew it was not funny in her life. But it was great to listen to, especially since I was no longer able to listen to the radio when my soaps stopped—especially “Helen Trent, the successful career girl and perfect size 12” could “find romance at 35 and beyond.” [It must have been possible since it ran for close to 40 years.] Those times when it was her mother on the phone it was usually unending grocery lists and dentist appointments. Except for that one time when Aunt Rose was looking for a seamstress to alter the sleeves on her new jacket. Fate intervened, and while I was snooping on the mother, she recommended a tailor to her sister. I wrote down the information to give to my aunt, who then got her jacket altered by the forementioned tailor.
That story was the common party line tale. But there was an unusual connection that was too good to be true. At Hamilton there was a very handsome, very popular, very much sighed-after boy when he was across the school yard. Let’s call him Jake (because there was no boy in his class named Jake). He was enamored of an astounding beautiful, very dear and kind girl named Mary, and she of him. There was another girl, who had NONE of Mary’s characteristics, not a one. She shall remain nameless, but I must stress that she was mean, snobby, spoiled, and ruthlessly determined. Nameless was certain that she could and would steal Jake from Mary and make him her own. When Mary got her own phone, it was on a party line. She was no snoop, so she didn’t know the identity of the party on her party line. I wish she had known much sooner, because that party was none other than Nameless, who snooped endlessly—most especially on calls between Jake and Mary. If Nameless had not lost her temper one day when Jake told Mary he loved her, Mary might never have known who that party was. But she did and yelled, “You bitch,” at Mary. And at the same moment, Jake found out how Nameless always showed up at almost every place he went—especially if he and Mary had made plans.
After graduation, no one stayed in touch with Nameless. Mary and Jake dated for a while after high school. But then she became a successful model and when she did marry, Hedda Hopper reported about the wedding of “her friend Mary” to someone famous. And from what mutual friends told over the decades, Mary and Hubby lived happily ever after.
I’m not looking for a moral to this story, rather I’m reporting that I foolishly Googled Jake. I wish I hadn’t. He passed away this past August. I fervently hope that he had a wonderful life.
Since, to the best of my knowledge the connection to others’ lines was by a random or some unknown rubric. First, I’ll disclose what I learned by snooping on others I didn’t know. Then, get ready for this... what can happen when random threatens to be disastrous; you cannot even imagine. Face it, you being so young just cuts you out of having heard of important things—like on party lines. Oh, and also how to keep yourself inaudible when you are snooping.The problem to be avoided was that there was the telltale click your phone made when you lifted your phone, that could be heard by others already on the line. Since that could have resulted in the party already on the line yelling, “I know you’re there. Hang up your phone, you nasty snoop!” Ah, yes, but my crafty girl friends and I figured out how to prevent being caught by those we were listening on. If we unscrewed the mouthpiece on our phone while holding down the connection button on my phone, I would remain unclicked when I listened in.
When I lived on Durango, at the phone number Crestview72634, the party line person was a sort of hapless woman who was just about “d’ une certaine age” who just wasn’t clicking (pardon the pun) with potentially-potential spouses. Even then, I knew it was not funny in her life. But it was great to listen to, especially since I was no longer able to listen to the radio when my soaps stopped—especially “Helen Trent, the successful career girl and perfect size 12” could “find romance at 35 and beyond.” [It must have been possible since it ran for close to 40 years.] Those times when it was her mother on the phone it was usually unending grocery lists and dentist appointments. Except for that one time when Aunt Rose was looking for a seamstress to alter the sleeves on her new jacket. Fate intervened, and while I was snooping on the mother, she recommended a tailor to her sister. I wrote down the information to give to my aunt, who then got her jacket altered by the forementioned tailor.
That story was the common party line tale. But there was an unusual connection that was too good to be true. At Hamilton there was a very handsome, very popular, very much sighed-after boy when he was across the school yard. Let’s call him Jake (because there was no boy in his class named Jake). He was enamored of an astounding beautiful, very dear and kind girl named Mary, and she of him. There was another girl, who had NONE of Mary’s characteristics, not a one. She shall remain nameless, but I must stress that she was mean, snobby, spoiled, and ruthlessly determined. Nameless was certain that she could and would steal Jake from Mary and make him her own. When Mary got her own phone, it was on a party line. She was no snoop, so she didn’t know the identity of the party on her party line. I wish she had known much sooner, because that party was none other than Nameless, who snooped endlessly—most especially on calls between Jake and Mary. If Nameless had not lost her temper one day when Jake told Mary he loved her, Mary might never have known who that party was. But she did and yelled, “You bitch,” at Mary. And at the same moment, Jake found out how Nameless always showed up at almost every place he went—especially if he and Mary had made plans.
After graduation, no one stayed in touch with Nameless. Mary and Jake dated for a while after high school. But then she became a successful model and when she did marry, Hedda Hopper reported about the wedding of “her friend Mary” to someone famous. And from what mutual friends told over the decades, Mary and Hubby lived happily ever after.
I’m not looking for a moral to this story, rather I’m reporting that I foolishly Googled Jake. I wish I hadn’t. He passed away this past August. I fervently hope that he had a wonderful life.
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