There is an ever-diminishing number of people in the world — I am one of them — who can remember a time when the only way to place a call from the street was to find a public telephone booth, step inside, lift the handset from the cradle, wait for the dial tone, and place a dime in the receiver. (Later a quarter. I am not old enough to remember a nickel toll.) But phone booths served other purposes, besides offering Clark Kent a spot to change into Superman. After the photo below was posted to Facebook on 2 March 2019 by Robert “Bobby” Busnach (1955-2019), who’s seen in one of the booths, Joe Concannon recalled in a comment: “One morning, many years ago, my friend Bertie, while nursing his usual massive hangover, sat in bewilderment staring at his knees, wondering why he had star-like indentations on his knee caps. [He realized it] was because he was on his knees in that very same phone booth while performing ‘lip service’ at 3 a.m. What memories. I think it was a long-distance call.” In the same thread, Ed Riseman copped to “many an awkward phone call to my parents from that phone box.”
¶ Last updated on 27 October 2020.
173 Commercial Street on the Town Map.
Also at 171-173 Commercial Street:
• Dyer’s Beach House Motel by the Sea | Dyer’s Waterfront Apartment.
• Coffey Men | Yates & Kennedy | Former B. H. Dyer & Company.
Thumbnail image: Photo posted to Facebook by Bobby Busnach, 2 March 2019.