Old telephone exchanges on store signs?

[luggee]

Hi everybody,

Forgive me for picking your brains yet again, but where else can I talk to 100's of fellow urban archaeologists?

This time I don't need fun quotes (like when you all pitched in to help me write the "Fantasy Conversions" column) but just locations, if you know of any.

I'm going to be writing about all the old Toronto telephone exchanges (PLymouth, GRover, EMpire, WAlnut) and how they used to define neighbourhoods and I'd like to illustrate with some pics of old store signage that still have their phone numbers listed this way (which would date these signs to about the mid-60s or earlier). I can think of one, off the top of my head, and it's an old jewellery store on the north side of Bloor West just west of Spadina...Simmons I think it's called...and another on a strip mall Chinese resto near me in the Bendale nabe of Scarborough. But I need at least 3 - 5 more.

Can anybody give me any leads?

Cheers,

DLeB

 

[Darkstar416]

Sorry I can't think of any. However, my mom used to tell me about her CHerry phone number from her youth in Weston. Perhaps look around the Weston area?

P.S. You wife is in the promotional video for a Leslieville condo (but you probably know that already). Regardless, say hi to "Shaunty" for me!

 

[cdl42]

Was that fantasy conversions article ever posted? I think I missed it.

 

[adma]

Not exactly exchange-era, but paying tribute to the same: the Grover pub at Kingston + Main, formerly the Grover Exchange...

 

[spmarshall]

Found my Ontario Motor League directory from 1952. Perfect for a discussion on this:

Hotel Waverley, Spadina Avenue: RAndolph 2141; Kelly's Tourist Home, Bedford Road, RA 7023.

Bloor Manor, 253 Bloor St E, MIdway 1989.

Pierson Hotel, Centre Island TR 0027.

Phillips House, 142 Jameson Ave, LAkeside 2014.

Rainbow Auto Court, 239 Lakeshore Rd, Mimico, JU 0300.

Silver Moon Motel, 221 Lakeshore Road, MUrray 0291.

For the Holiday Inn Haliburton, there was a direct Toronto office, 159 Bay St, EMpire 4-5089

If you wanted the Green Acres Motel in Port Credit, you told the operator to call Port Credit 4221. (This was what is was like in smaller centres, just 4-digit numbers, larger ones like Sudbury had 5 digit numbers, like the EMpire exchange.


I like how sometimes the Simpsons uses the KLondike exchange (ie Mr. Plow) , KL5-4796 instead of just 555-4796.

 

[adma]

It was, indeed, published.

Can't recall if it's still there (or if it's gone, it's within the last year or two); but in Parkdale, there's that laundromat on the S side of Queen W of Dunn (next door to the Vice offices, of all things) with the ancient Coca-Cola-logo'd sign with an "exchange-era" phone #--with six digits, interestingly enough...

 

[spmarshall]

Brampton was GLendale, so now most numbers in the older part of Brampton are 45X-XXXX. There was an old sign up in an alleyway barber shop with a GL number - it was removed only last year. A street near the downtown was named for the Glendale exchange.

 

[unimaginative2]

I know Kitchener was SHerwood. I remember looking up a business number in the phone book a year or two ago and discovering that the listing was still a Zenith number, which was toll-free. I immediately excitedly called up the operator and said "Get me Zenith 5492!" only to be told that they had started phasing out the last of the Zenith numbers, and I could simply call this 1-800 number. I was terribly disappointed.

 

[CliffColeclough]

I remember calling ZEnith 55-100 in order to reach CKOC in Hamilton for their contests. I never made it thru though.

 

[dashingdan]

I don't know of any signs, but I remember my dad saying their phone numbers in Port Credit used to be CRescent (27). My old number used to start with 274.

 

[adma]

Can't recall if it's still there (or if it's gone, it's within the last year or two); but in Parkdale, there's that laundromat on the S side of Queen W of Dunn (next door to the Vice offices, of all things) with the ancient Coca-Cola-logo'd sign with an "exchange-era" phone #--with six digits, interestingly enough...

It's still there. In fact, I'd practically recommend it for lead-photo status. (It's up there w/Czehoski in Queen St vintage-signdom...)

 

[adma]

Article in today's Globe, folks.