It was June 20^th, 2010—Father’s Day—when antique telephone enthusiast Dan Vogt and his wife visited a flea market near their Ohio home in search of a Vintage Rotary Phone.  Actually the “flea-tique” market was just over the border, in Kentucky.  Looking to add something to his telephone collection, Dan and his wife were on the hunt for any type of Vintage Rotary Phone—or anything else cool for that matter.  What Dan and his wife found that day was a thrill they may not again experience for some time. Read the rest of this post »

Back in May of this year I was contacted by a gentleman in the San Francisco area.  He told me that he had been holding on to a telephone that once belonged to his grandmother.  The phone had been sitting in a closet for twenty-five years, since he purchased it from the Telephone Company after his grandmother passed.  Jim wrote in part,  “My Grandmother loved to talk on the telephone and many of my fondest memories are of her sitting in her big chair talking on it.  I believe the phone is a Western Electric Model 202 from 1930-1937.”

Jim asked if I could refurbish the phone and agreed to e-mail me photographs.  I told him that I was sure I could help and the phone was soon headed east.This is one of the photos that Jim e-mailed to me.  Attached to the ringer box was a smaller box with a switch on the top.  It was unfamiliar to me but I guessed that it either switched to a second phone line or was used to switch the ringer on and off.  It looks like there were several coats of paint after all these years.  I had my work cut out for me—but it looked like it was going to be a fun project. Read the rest of this post »