Phone number keypad question?

[StrangeRanger]

Sorry, but I don't feel like working this morning, was sitting here spacing and just got to wondering...why do the letters on phone keypads start on the #2 and not on the #1?
j

 

[WannaFly]

911
611
411
...

 

[imported_Pablo]

Originally posted by: WannaFly
911
611
411
...

Genius.

 

[kranky]

When telephone numbers universally became seven digits, they decided that people needed some mechanism to help them remember the longer numbers. So they made words out of the "exchange" - at that time, the first three digits. So 276-1234 might have been referred to as BROadway 1234. (Later, they needed an extra digit for the exchange, so it might have become BRoadway 6-1234.

No local numbers ever started with the digit 1, so they didn't need any letters on the 1 key.

 

[quakefiend420]

Originally posted by: kranky
When telephone numbers universally became seven digits, they decided that people needed some mechanism to help them remember the longer numbers. So they made words out of the "exchange" - at that time, the first three digits. So 276-1234 might have been referred to as BROadway 1234. (Later, they needed an extra digit for the exchange, so it might have become BRoadway 6-1234.

No local numbers ever started with the digit 1, so they didn't need any letters on the 1 key.

well...i just learned something new 🙂

 

[MikeyIs4Dcats]

The obvious question in all this is why the phone company didn't assign letters to the number 1, which would have permitted the entire alphabet to make the trip. This is where the genius part comes in. It turns out that Bell wanted to reserve 0 and 1 for special "flag" functions when used in the first couple of positions in the dialing sequence. 0, of course, is used to signal the operator. An initial 1 nowadays indicates a long distance number and is also used in shorthand numbers as 411 (directory assistance), 611 (phone repair), 911 (emergency dispatch), and 011 (international long-distance access). Until a few years ago, the second digit of every area code was either a 0 or a 1, another cue for the switching computers. (Starting all long distance numbers with 1 eliminated the need for this practice and made it possible to create many more area codes, but that's a topic for another day.) Assigning letters to the number 1 would have meant that it occasionally would be used as one of the first two digits of an ordinary local call, which would have fouled up the routing system.

Straight Dope > you

 

[kranky]

Well, straightdope got that one wrong, and I'll explain why.

The reason that no local numbers (or *any* numbers, at that time) started with a "1" is that with the old-style phones which used a switchhook, the switchhook could jiggle a bit when the receiver was lifted, and to the phone system that would appear as if a "1" was dialed. That's the way the old pulse dialing system worked - on/off pulses on the line. (You could jiggle the switchhook up and down with your finger and if you had good timing, you could actually dial calls that way.)

So allowing phone numbers to begin with a "1" would have meant a whole lot of unhappy customers and wrong numbers. The switching system was programmed to ignore any initial digit of "1" since it was likely to be a switchhook bounce.

Straightdope is right to a point about reserving 0 and 1 - but it was reserved to be used in the SECOND digit position only. That's how the switching equipment knew that an area code was being dialed (the second digit of all area codes were 0 or 1).

 

[rh71]

where's that site that found word combinations with the numbers you fed it ?

 

[kranky]

Originally posted by: rh71
where's that site that found word combinations with the numbers you fed it ?

phonespell.com