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People born in the 1900s, what was life like back then? (feddit.org)

submitted 2 days ago by unhinged_walnut39@feddit.org to c/asklemmy@lemmy.world

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[-] noxypaws@pawb.social 5 points 1 day ago

the house had one telephone line, but often there were two or three phones sharing it. an incoming call could be for anyone, and would ring all of the phones, and any or all of the phones could answer it or join it just by picking up.

so if one was quiet enough, one could easily eavesdrop on the phone conversation in the kitchen by using the basement phone.

if a call came in while someone was on the line, busy signal. MAYBE call waiting where you put one on hold and answer the incoming.

and of course dialup internet coexisted with all of this. your massive download could get corrupted if someone picked up a phone while you're connected.

[-] AA5B@lemmy.world 3 points 13 hours ago

Lived through this world

my grandparents were on a party line for ast my college graduation
my parents built their house when AT&T started being opened up, so it was a new thing that we had many phone jacks throughout the house without having to pay them
my parents had a single phone line, shared among multiple phones and dialup
in the 80s I started knowing people with multiple phone lines, for dialup and voice.
about 1990 I got my own ISDN connection for high speed internet (arguably before internet existed) so I didn’t have to block my voice line

To be complete, dsl in the late 90s, then fiber in early 00s, gigabit fiber in 2020

this post was submitted on 31 May 2026

145 points (100.0% liked)

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