The Courier-Journal from Louisville, Kentucky • Page 46

HUM AS ft It By 'rma amin OTAND by for an international hook-up of human emotions a transitory cross-section of pulsating humanity strunj taut over a vast network of telephone wires in infinite space. The turn of a dial, the ring cf a bell, the flash of a light, the sound of a voice somewhere out there, and a potential suicide Is saved from self-destruction, the hard-boiled big business man is magically transformed into a daddy, the long-lost prodigal into a penitent son. the sophisticated society lea'der Into a captured criminal. And unendingly, with the ceaseless aid of that tireless plugger. the girl at the switchboard, the colorful mosnic pattern of humanity goes kaleidcscoplcally on The infancy of this modern Aladdin, the telephone, was emphasized recently in the death In California of Mrs.

John D. McDonnell. 80. who enjoyed the sobriquet of the wor'd's first hello girl. MrS.

McDonnell came to America from Ireland when a small girl, and lied In the same house where Alexander Graham Bell was experimenting with the telephone. Bell used her as an aide. "You say 'Hello' while I listen," ne told her historic monologue which presaged the ultimate world-wide tongue to car communication. Switchboard Service at Capitol IT'S a far cry from thru modest home in Massachusetts to the White House in Washington, but call the White House at any hour of any day and the chances are 1 to 3 that you will be answered by the well-modulated, rich contralto voice of Louise Hachmeister, President Roosevelt's personal tele-phone operator. Louise is the first woman to pull wires at the White House switchboard.

It a she who puts through all the personal calls to F. D. R. Her voice with a smile has won for her the affectionate title of Hacky or Happy. Always calm, yet ever humanly sympathetic, she la a regular fellow with all the White House force.

now finds it a simple matter to plug In the calls Without touching the sw'itchboard he can tell by the drop on th board signal which of the sixty phones on his line is railing. Electric stcrms have blown out the switchbeard fuses. Dan is readily able to replace them. completes long-distance calls with the sk.ll of a normal operator. Once in the middle of the night a firebug, who had been terrifying the little community, was apprehended by Dan.

who was notified at his home and unassisted rushed to his switchboard -and In turn "notified every farmer and fire department and policeman In the vicinity. Earthquekes produce their comedies as well as their tragedies. Here is cne story about an operator heroically st.cklr.g to her switchboard during the recent California earthquake, who was heard to say nonchalantly tn professional voice to a woman In Pennsylvania who. having finally put a call through to Los Angeles, was experiencing much difficulty in getting her party there: "Sorry, madam, youl) have to wait a while for your connection: we're having an earthquake cut here. And finally, along with public citations and medals foi Initiative, persistence, courage and efficiency ct known heroes of the switchboard, let's give three silent cheers to this one of the many unsung heroines of the telephone service.

Girl Prevents Suicide ON A recent morning Abraham Jones dropped a nickel in a pay telephone. "Stillwell 4 "he said Hs heard the connection made. He heard the operator ringing the number. Finally "They do not answer." "I wender if 1 could leave a message with you to give them? Jor.es asked. "It Is most important-and I am going The operator was about ts refer him to her supervisor, but she paused, listening as he blurted hi.

natna and address and the of the people he wanted jo reach. The Girl at tho Switchboard Sees a Colorful Mosaic Pattern of Humanity as It Goes Kalcidoscopically On exclaimed to him breathlessly over the telephone. "Ah you theah?" And he was. Niagara Falls and American telephone operators now head his personal Baedeker of Amerl-can marvels. Then there's the story of Louis Trout.

Rio (Wis.) farmer, whose escape from the Rio Jail seemed so certain that he finally stopped at a dis -Just tell them Jones cauea. no hurried on. "and that he said ne-wanted them to have all his personal effects That's all. lady, except-much obliged to you." Gently he replaced the receiver on the hock. At the telephone office the surprised operator repeated to herself the message she had been asked to deliver.

"Tll them I want them to have all personal effects." She said to herrelf: "That's an odd message. It like a will. I wonder She talked to her supervisor, who called a nearby pohee station. "This is the telephone offlee." the supervisor said. "There is a man nrmei Abraham Jones who lives at 235 East 103d Street.

He just called and aiked us to deliver a message to some people. It sounded like a Till. You don suppose he Th? sergeant Elammed down the receiver. 'Officer Denlmm!" he barkeu. "Yes sir" "Abraham Jones 233 East 103d break in if you have to and make it snappy." At Jones place there was no answer to the officer's knack.

The A telephone operator assisted in the cap ure of a trio of bandits by quickly calling the as the robbers' victim lay on the floor of his filling station Capitol it must be possible tc call and ask only for the Clerk of the House if he IS wanted Th? operator must know the number of his phone The call may be for Senator Robinson. The operator must know there are two Senator Robinsons, one from Arkansas and one from Indiana. Mrs. Daley is rounding out her thirty-fifth year In this spectacular production. She started her act back in 18:8.

when thp first switchboard with fifty-one stations for the Capitol was set up in a-window nook in one of the corridors. From 8 in the morning until 6 at night she went through her acts, and wh night A farmer who escaped from a jail In Wisconsin made tho mistake cf using the telephone to jorh the Sheriff. He was recaptured five minutes after hij conversation po iceman hurled himself agalt-et the ticor, and the lock gave way. Jh--hrm Johes lav on the kitchen fldor Every Jet oi Miss Hachmeister got her telephone start in the New York telephone service, ar.d although she has filled every post from bottom up to the head supervisor for the telephone company, she modestly attributes her present envlablp job to just plain luck. "The Governcr (meaning the President) wanted an operator fcr the National Democratic Headquarters in New York, so the telephone company happened to send me.

And. of course. I get to know everybody, so they sent me on to Chicago fcr the convention, and after that they just naturally sent me dewn here," says this merry-eyed philosopher. Eelieve that or not! But this writer wrs told that thf real reason for Happy appointment was her uncanny ability to Ircnte people at far distant points at odd nours and on short notice. And sperk ng cf feminine switchbrard Sherlock here's the story cf one who alv.ays gets her party, ti which a certain Englishman somewhere in th? world will readily testify.

Recently this Br.tisher. visiting Pittsburgh, where Sylvia Kramer works at an operator at the attended pay stations in the Pennsylvania Railroad staticn. approached the pay desk and tcld her he was looking for a salesman whom he had met in London. "He works for an olive cil importing firm, but I've lost the card containing his name and address. I do remember however, that his samples carried the label Made in Pitts- etove wis wide open the A 1 a ed at the telephone exchange.

flasi This is a new-PPer said a voice. "A window henea tried to till himself with gas He washer to a'l 2ht. but the police tell me he'd have died for one of vour operators. It wi.i mass if it hadn't a nice little plede for the papers. What's her name?" tant town and called up the Sheriff Just to "kid him a bit." "Where are you calling from?" naively Inquired the astonished keeper of the peace "That's for ycu to find out," wlscrrarkrd the fugitive Five minutes later a Horlcon marshal arrested him A longdistance operator had merely done her duty by saying a usual when connecting the Sheriff.

"Horlcon calling Sheriff Roche." Charles Thompson, of East Liverpool. after being bound hand and foot and robbed in his filling station, rolled over to his telephone, extricated the gag from his mouth, knocked the receiver off the hock with his mouth, and quickly tcld the exchange operator to call the police, whd took up the chase find soon rounded up thp bandit trio. "See the evil, hear the evil and speak the evil" as quickly as possible when It is a public menace, is the motto of Miss Minnie Ricardlna. a Jeannett? (Pa ts'ephcne operator. She happened to see from her switchboard vantage point a man forcing his way Into a candy store Just opposite It was night.

She was unarmed, except for her ersy communication with the outside world which she used pronto, and by so doing apprehended an ex-convict who had led a life of cr.me intermittently for seventeen year The political stege furnishes another setting for the tense telephonic theatre. The scene is an attic room In the House Office Building at Eighteen unknewn feminine actors with earphones for "props" are busy at a telephone switchboard. Suddenly a red light flashes on one of the sections Just an ordinary red light like hundreds of others There is a slight stiffening of the operator's back at the flash ct that light. Her hands work swiftly, but ever carefully. She throws a glance over her shoulder.

And that is the cue for the feminine lead. Mrs Harriet C. Daley, to take "center stage" and do her stuff. Mrs. Daley, a gentle, gray-haired woman, has been unostentatiously seated until now at the supervisor's desk.

She gets up quickly and stands clcse to the board. "Careful, girls, the Pres dent is on the line." That's her longest verbal part. The rest is action. The work goes on swiftly with a deliberateness. The outs de conversation continues for several minutes longer.

The light flashes on again. The President has hung up. "Right, girls." speaks Mrs Daley, "the President has finishrd Put that last terse speech is no signal for a letdown of efficiency. ive out the names of company employes." "We do net -1 am Ecrry." And she pulled the the saitf sessions came along, she orten stsggercd home, numb Trcm, fatigue, at 1 or 2 o'clock In the mrrnlng Now she is of thr.t small inner circle of veterans whom Congressmen never fail to virit v. hen they stop in Washington.

"Sry. will ycu ever forget that night when that Appropriations Bill was going throuah?" Will she ever forget? Never. Why she even rem-mbers the exact number they had such a hard tlm- getth-17 To the workatlay world of telephone. Dan Lynn he only operator ot the little Redstone Home Mutual Company cn a quiet byroad, off the Brownsville-Fayette City Highway, near Gillrrpie. Pa is jvst a pleasant voice But there is aiuch more than that to the man whose remarkable efficirncy and uncanny deftness despUe total lindnrss establishes the between this tiny antiquated switchboard and the national system.

Den was not always ind. In 1E05 he was hale hearty and 21. a young husband and a proud father, making a comfortable living rs a coal rutter in th? Old Washington mine near Fayette City. Cne day a steel spl'nter flew off the coaj drill Dan was usin-r and lodged in his left eye. They brought him out cf the darkness below into everlasting black night fcr Dan total b'irdness.

"Canie the with the offer of the job as operator on the siw.tchbrard With but one telephone conversation to his credit. Dan r.ccrrted. and you know the rest, except that with the aid of his wife, only in the beginning. Dan flaeh'd cn the board before her. She said: "I'll ring them again "They do hot Other lights 'Number please" pnswer And now jut one more incident.

This story His to do with a recent transcontinental broade from Uncle Sam's mail plan cobing to several mir.cn listeners through medium cf the radiophone, telephen-: ar.J radio. The stunt was opened by former Postmaster General Brown: th-n aviators, flying planes on their routes, ctartcd talkinj to the airport in Newerk. N. and to each other, taking up a conversation, step by step, all the way from the Atlantic to tho pc-hfp rnHif nf it 1 1 was a most important cog. The girl who helped ou hear it was the "number please" girl.

i CcVirtuhl Ly I'ttblic Inc. She Always Gets Her Man PHE next minute may see a hurried call from the Demo- cratic Party to get Its mtmbers together. A Democratic bill is nearlng the tote on the House floor. In a few minutes all the Democratic Congressmen have been notified at their offices that they are needed Perhaps some one sponsoring a bill has been asked a highly technical question abnut his legls'ation He cannot answer but he knews a man in New York who can. Another cue for Mrs.

Daley She steps out of the wings and personally calls the man in question. He may be in Miami. He is trailed to his hotel there by telephone He has gone to the club. Paging Mr. So and So! And In twenty minutes or less the Eastern seabcard has been coven and Mr.

Expert la giving ConaTCss the benefit of his technical knowledge. Some Congressmen have a way of making unexpected trips out of town just rs a bill Is approechint a vote with a close margin He and his vote are needed back on the floor Another entrance cue for Mrs Daley, who trails him Trom one railroad station to another until finally a stationmaster stepe into the show In the role ot detective" and gets the "wanted man" off cf one train and on to another headed back for Washington. The participants in this particular Washington scene act under difficulties unknown to most operators. There are 1149 stations on their exchange. To expedite calls Into the "You say 'Hello' while I listen," said Alexander Graham Bsll to hij assistant, who thereupon became the world's first hello girl And upon this fragile bit of Information.

Sylvia went about her job of finding the human needle In the haystack of Pittsburgh 600 000 Inhabitants. Oiive oil food Italian focd restaurant Italian restaurant, registered Miss Kramers fertile mind. Perhaps the manager cf one of these might know the name of an olive oil salesman who had spent hlr vacation in London. And he did! She got her man, and a certain Englishman A Congressman making an unexpected trip out of town is cften called baelt to the Capitol by a phone operator who has trailed him from cne rall.oad talen to another 3 tgd 'I.