• After 15+ years, we've made a big change: Android Forums is now Early Bird Club. Learn more here.

When I was a kid...

Okay, it's 8PM ET and I've kept you guessing long enough. Great guesses all... but what IS this thing?

PD.jpg

If you want the answer, hit below. If you want to keep guessing, don't.


Answer follows:

This is a high-end rotary phone dialer. Folks (especially women with nice nails who didn't want to crack or break them in the phone dial) would insert the round part into the holes and spin the dial around, making the call. Insert, dial, remove, and on to the next number, and the next...

Anyway, that's what it is! A rotary phone dialer. My grandma had one (albeit plastic... we weren't high-fa-lootin' :) )

:D
 
no wonder I didn't guees it. we couldn't afford plastic our women couldn't afford nails either :D a pencil worked fine for my granmother. She could dial with it write with it and throw it at you all in the same phone call.
 
olbriar said:
We had fuses instead of breakers. Nothing was grounded. Most cords were insulated with cloth. Clothes dried on a line between poles in the back yard. They were attached to the line with clothes pins that you could make lots of neat toys out of if your mom didn't catch ya. Wood flooring was the norm and not a decorator item. A fireplace was to cook beans and to help keep warm. It burned wood and wasn't electric with a remote. Windows had one pane of glass and you could carve neat sculptors in the ice that would form on the inside during the winter months.
Growing vegetables was not a hobby.
Click to expand...
And the clothes line made a good "whip your butt" gadget! Yes, we would use the clothes pin to make all kinds of stuff out of.

When I was very young, I'm 7 of 7 kids, so I didn't deal with it much, but we had coal stoves for heating and cooking, the olders ones had to go get ice for the icebox also. By the time I was old enough, we had moved into a modern apt, with hot & cold running water along with central heating. A/C was out of the question during this time for us.
 
The_Chief said:
Not being Canadian, I can only hope that "Conjunction Junction, What's Your Function?" DOES, in fact, apply up there :)
Click to expand...

I remember Conjunction Junction. I never understood what it meant until years later. At the time, I thought it was a cool bit. I also remember that one about the bill on capital hill.
 
Roze said:
So...kids can use their smartphone in class now? Or I guess each student gets an iPad? lol

@ the Chief, nice little game. I would never have guessed it in the world.
Click to expand...

I remember when I wasn't allowed to use a calculator in class. Then I remember the first time I was allowed to use a calculator in class.
 
Stuntman said:
I remember when I wasn't allowed to use a calculator in class. Then I remember the first time I was allowed to use a calculator in class.
Click to expand...

I remember when there WEREN'T calculators at all! :eek:

In fact, the first calculators had red LED numbers, and the big thing was inputting 0.7734 and 71077345 then turning it upside down. Of course, digital watches were just coming out too... and they were both wildly expensive. A good TI calculator would easily set you back $100+. and that was in 1970s dollars! Now you can buy them at the dollar store.

I bought a TI-30X calculator in 1982 for over $100. It got me through all my electronics schools, a 20+ year Navy career, and 10 years after that as the family calculator. Now I've been rocking it for almost 30 years to the day.

And I have YET to change the battery in it.
 
I've actually learned how to use an abacus. My father had one and I had a book that teaches you. I didn't quite learned how to do all long division problems on the abacus. I could only do addition, subtraction and multiplication. It was more of a hobby than anything. I was quite slow.

My wife had one of those TI graphics calculators. The funny thing is I have an app on my phone that emulates it exactly.
 
Stuntman said:
I remember when I wasn't allowed to use a calculator in class. Then I remember the first time I was allowed to use a calculator in class.
Click to expand...

The_Chief said:
I remember when there WEREN'T calculators at all! :eek:

In fact, the first calculators had red LED numbers, and the big thing was inputting 0.7734 and 71077345 then turning it upside down. Of course, digital watches were just coming out too... and they were both wildly expensive. A good TI calculator would easily set you back $100+. and that was in 1970s dollars! Now you can buy them at the dollar store.

I bought a TI-30X calculator in 1982 for over $100. It got me through all my electronics schools, a 20+ year Navy career, and 10 years after that as the family calculator. Now I've been rocking it for almost 30 years to the day.

And I have YET to change the battery in it.
Click to expand...

Stuntman said:
I've actually learned how to use an abacus. My father had one and I had a book that teaches you. I didn't quite learned how to do all long division problems on the abacus. I could only do addition, subtraction and multiplication. It was more of a hobby than anything. I was quite slow.

My wife had one of those TI graphics calculators. The funny thing is I have an app on my phone that emulates it exactly.
Click to expand...

Calculators?! Calculators?!

Who has ever used this, my first high school "calculator"?

Figure0_SR_Parts_med.jpg
 
Wow y'all have all kinds of fancy contraptions. When I went to school we had were able to count fly's only problem was we kept eating them. Tasty little creatures they are. We learned subtraction real well though :D
 
olbriar said:
Have you ever tried using one of the circular slide rules?
Click to expand...


I remember one kid had the circular one, but he went back to the traditional slide rule because the circular one didn't fit into his plastic pocket protector (where is the "geek" smiley?) :-P
 
I remember when you couldn't go to the store and buy a phone. Remember that?

Ma Bell controlled ALL phones in America (they called them "instruments"), and you couldn't purchase it outright: you had to LEASE the instrument and the lease fee was added to your phone bill.

Good news was that, since Bell "owned" them, they fixed or replaced them when they broke. Bad news is that once Ma Bell was broken up, the leases continued on unsuspecting folks unless they called and had it stopped. In fact, I would be willing to bet that there are still THOUSANDS of elderly folks still paying a lease fee on their bill for decades-old "instruments".

Bell System Property - Not for Sale
 
If you dropped the phone's handset you might easily lose a toe. It must have weighed in at ten pounds or so.... could easily double as a hammer.

And as for the Citizen Band radio.. CB, I quit about the time it became popular with the truckers. I was official with a FCC license and a loved Johnson base radio. :)
First CB was home made Heathkit radio... a two channel job. Do you remember Heathkit projects?
images
 
argedion said:
no wonder I didn't guees it. we couldn't afford plastic our women couldn't afford nails either :D a pencil worked fine for my granmother. She could dial with it write with it and throw it at you all in the same phone call.
Click to expand...
But you could afford a "coke spoon"? ;) and the sweet cola you stir it with?:eek::p
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom