Transcription: I.U.’s New Telephone System Compares to That of Small City
By Robert Loy
To adequately handle the telephone needs of the students in the I.U. Halls of Residence, a telephone system comparable to that of a small city is needed.
Because the old system could not adequately handle the needs of a greatly expanded student body, the new Halls of Residence telephone system, with the switchboard located in the University Library Annex, was constructed.
Leader in Trend.
The big Halls of Residence telephone system make I.U. one of the leaders in a national trend among colleges toward consolidation of dormitory telephone systems. The new system, in operation since February 5, uses one switchboard and consolidates telephone service formerly handled by three’s switchboards.
With the new system, the University has ben able to place telephones in individual dormitory rooms, eliminating the old pay telephones, which were used in the halls. The system is not complete yet as all the telephones have not been installed. About 2,240 telephones have been installed, but with the opening of the new housing unit next September, the figure will be increased to 3,000.
Twenty-Four Hour Service
In addition to providing better and faster service through central supervision of calls, the new telephone system provides a single information file and twenty-four hour service. However only emergency calls are handled after 10:45 o’clock at night.
Each local call costs the student five cents. Long distance calls are charged at regular rates. The Halls of Residence telephone system is the only Bell system which uses the I.B.M. card system to keep a record of all calls. Each time a call is made the operator marks a card with a special graphite pencil. These cards are taken each day to the I.B.M. machines in the Administration Building which sort and file them according to telephone numbers. The cards are then presented to the student when he pays his telephone bill.
Designed for 14,000.
The new telephone installation was designed to meet the needs of 14,000 students, but provides service for about 6,000 at the present time.
The switchboard is a twelve position board and requires twenty-two operates to man it. The heaviest load on the board comes from about 5:30 to 7:30 o’clock in the evening when all twelve positions have to be filled to handle the calls. There is another rush period from about 10:30 to 10:45 o’clock at night. During the day the full twelve operators are put on as they are needed.
The new installation requires nearly twenty-seven million conduction feet of wire in underground cables, and more than two million feet of wire in interior station distribution cables in buildings.
