Re: Magneto (crank) telephone system still in use.

In the late 1950's, one fall my dad and I went deer hunting in the
country out south of Cerro Summit. The railroad was long gone by then of course.
Dad was acquainted with a fellow that had a ranch out that way and had invited us to hunt there.

I had always had an interest in telephone, telegraph, pole lines and such, and on this hunting trip, the ranch cabin we stayed at had an old time "crank & holler" telephone in it. It was functional too...Twist the crank a couple times, and the operator came on and asked "number please"...

Not only that, I noticed the line that it was connected to was a SINGLE IRON WIRE....one insulator on a side bracket at the top of the poles, appearing the same as a single telegraph wire. The "drop"
to the cabin was also a single wire bridged on the main wire that went on south somewhere.

But the phone was NOT a "telegraphone", it was just a common WECo wood cabinet wall mounted local battery magneto telephone.

I was intrigued by the fact that this unusual telephone line down through that country was just a single wire and I paid close attention to the line as we concluded our hunting (skunked, no deer) and drove the country road back north to Cerro Summit and the highway.

I noticed the single wire joined the Mountain Bell toll pole line at
Cerro Summit. I don't know which way the terminating office was from there, but it was interesting to me that there even was such a line in existence out there. There were no powerlines near it anywhere, so
it actually probably worked okay.

I never went back there to check it out any further, but I often wished I had. That was over sixty years ago now, I am sure all of it is long gone.