One of my sneaky little pleasures, when I have time, is to watch old Perry Mason reruns. I enjoy the stories but I also enjoy seeing the fashions, women wearing hats and gloves, men in suits and ties, and always wearing hats, and the huge old cars from the 50s and 60s. I dated some of those cars. My favorite was a 1957 baby blue and white Chevy. The guy was nice too. The other day I was watching what, when I did a little research, turned out to be the first episode every filmed. It was filmed in October of 1956 but didn't air until September of 1957. What caught my attention in this episode was one quick scene when Perry is making a phone call in a phone booth. Instead of the typical box with a receiver style phone I had always seen in phone booths, the phone he was using had a separate receiver (earpiece only), with the part you speak into built into the box. I was interested to see this because it reminded me the first phone I ever used. When my family moved out to 'the country' near Woodburn in 1953 that was the kind of phone we had. Not a pay phone, obviously, but a big box phone that hung on the wall in the kitchen. We were on a party line of course and our ring was two longs and a short. The thing with a party line was that there was nothing to keep anyone else on the line from picking up their receiver and listening in on your conversation. This didn't allow much privacy for business calls, but it was great if you and three or four girlfriends wanted to talk at the same time. Sort of an audible group text. Ah sweet memories.
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