John,
About 40 years ago (that would be about 1974) I was driving my VW Bug from home in Pasadena to Ely, Nevada and Salt Lake City, Utah. The fan belt failed as I came over the summit west of Cima Road on the interstate (I-10). I coasted down the hill and got off the interstate at Cima Road. There was a Shockley (sp?) Pecan store that pumped gas at that location. I was directed to the payphone outside the building to call the Auto Club contract service in Baker.
The payphone was on a ring circuit and the typical payphone had special instructions and a magneto box below it. Pick-up the phone check and see that the line was not in use; replace head set; crank the magneto; pick the head set back up and when the operator answers tell her that you are at "windmill number 2."
My one experience with a hand crank phone.
Brian Norden
P.S. the Auto Club contract service driver, on his way to me, picked up a new fan belt at one of the gas stations on the road and I paid for it and we put it on the car. He said that already that day he had been to Death Valley and the Nevada State Line,