Telephone operators staffed this manual switchboard in Dallas in 1907, 14 years before automatic dial systems started connecting Southwestern Bell subscribers. Photo: Courtesy of AT&T Archives and History Center
Local exchange service began in Dallas in 1881, with just 40 subscribers connected through a switchboard operating out of a building on Elm Street.
By 1900, there were over 3,200 subscribers in Dallas, per Caughlin's research.
Why it matters: While telephone companies have changed hands and names often since the 1870s, Dallas has remained a testing ground for new technology.
The intrigue: A.H. Belo, the founder of the Dallas Morning News and the Galveston News, learned about Bell's telephone at the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial Expo and wanted one as soon as possible.
Two years later, he had a line installed between his Galveston home and newspaper office. It was reportedly one of the first 1,000 telephones installed nationwide, per the Texas State Historical Association.
Flashback: The first long-distance line in Texas opened on August 2, 1882, connecting Dallas and Lancaster, less than 20 miles away.
In 1921, a Dallas office for Southwestern Bell became the first in the country to use dial equipment manufactured and installed by the company's employees.
In April 1924, Dallas had 50,000 telephones, the most of any city south of the Mason-Dixon Line, Caughlin says.
At the time, operators would route incoming calls to their destinations.
Fun fact: The AT&T headquarters in downtown Dallas is located where a telephone exchange used to be.
What they're saying: "I always tell people I have the best job at AT&T because I get to share all of these wonderful stories from our past," Caughlin tells Axios.
