BELL-1ANG | Readiness to Serve (annonce anglaise)
Readiness to Serve (annonce anglaise)
1917, 20e siècle
Collection historique Bell Canada
BELL-1ANG
Cet artefact appartient à : © Bell Canada
Description
Mots-clés :
Clefs pour l'histoire
Operators, or "The Voice with a Smile"
To subscribers, operators personify both the telephone company and service. While telegraphic service requiring a certain amount of technical knowledge was provided by young men, operating telephones was defined as women's work. Why did companies prefer women operators? A number of reasons were advanced - "clear speaking voice," "courtesy," "patience" and "visual acuity." In short, the work required qualities and abilities that telephone executives considered to be unique to women. Many working-class women were hired as telephone operators. For them it was a step up on the social ladder.
The work of a telephone operator was very demanding. Operators not only had to concentrate and be polite at all times, they also had to wear a heavy headset, do repetitive movements and repeat phrases learned by heart all day long, and work at a frantic pace at the busiest times.
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Quoi
Prior to the invention of the rotary dial telephone, all calls had to be placed by an operator. Even with the advent of automatic switches, operators remained essential for long-distance calls. This public service ad reminds people to be courteous on the telephone.
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Où
Advertisements were carried in all the newspapers of the period, which were the main mass medium before the advent of radio.
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Quand
Between 1880 and the 1920s, operators played a crucial role in making local telephone calls. In 1907, 400 Toronto operators went on strike for better working conditions.
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Qui
The telephone companies preferred to hire unmarried young women. In 1907, in Toronto, they were paid $25 a month for a six-day, 48-hour workweek.
Étiquette d'exposition
Références
- Canada, Toronto Telephone Commission, Report of the Royal Commission on a Dispute Respecting Hours of Employment Between the Bell Telephone Company of Canada Limited and Operators at Toronto, Ottawa, Ontario, Department of Labour, 1907, 102 p.
- Venus Green, Race on the Line. Gender, Labor, and Technology in the Bell System, 1880-1980, Durham, NC, Duke University Press, 2001, 370 p.
- Kenneth Lipartito, " When Women Were Switches: Technology, Work, and Gender in the Telephone Industry, 1890-1920 ", American Historical Review, vol. 99, no 4, 1994, p. 1074-1111.
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