Telecommunications is an industry extending back over 160 years. In that time the conditions under which people work have been transformed, reflecting changes in society.
For most of its history in Britain, telecommunications service was provided by the Post Office. It's easy to forget just how big this operation was. At its peak The GPO was the country's largest employer, providing work for one in 50 of all British employees - more than 300,000 people in all.
For these people, working for the Post Office was a lifetime career from apprenticeship to retirement - a job that also became a way of life.
Working for a telegraph company was demanding, but it did provide women with an opportunity for respectable employment when such positions were rare.
Women could expect to be paid a maximum of 10 shillings a week while their male counterparts earned up to 30 shillings. The work was not too strenuous and women were allowed to read, knit or do needlework between messages. However, the working week was 60 hours over 6 days.
Not everyone was supportive and some critics complained that: 'women tended to lower the tone of the service...the whole tendency is to lightness and flippancy', although you might be forgiven for thinking that, with that attitude, it was exactly what was needed. Nevertheless, as was common practice of the time, men and women were kept strictly separate and the male clerks were forbidden to speak to the female trainees under threat of instant dismissal.
The Operator's Manual was the bible of the exchange room, which governed an operator's behaviour, conduct and activities. The booklet had to be read and understood, with all regulations strictly observed, because - as it stated - 'Any breach of the rules will be severely dealt with and will render an operator liable to dismissal. Ignorance of these rules will not be accepted as an excuse.'
The rules served as a form of contract in the days before individual agreements were generally signed. The contents were divided into five main areas:
General - Attendance - Conduct - Secrecy - Operating Instructions.
Operators were coached how to be polite and business-like, what terms to use for subscribers' call instructions and the pricing structure. They were also warned that divulging the contents of any message or call might result in a hefty fine, prison and possibly hard labour! Aside from pay, the only benefits were a paltry two weeks holiday each year.
Dorothy Belsham, joined the Post Office as a Telephonist in 1928 where she worked until 1937. She thoroughly enjoyed her career despite some of the rules and regulations.
She recalls the strict rules laid down on timekeeping and private calls, which she sometimes failed to keep to her own cost.
Play the audio clip and view the transcript to learn more. A new window will open.Peter Newman is a retired ex-Post Office and BT engineer who worked for the Post Office from 1946 until 1986, mainly on the long distance area working in Faraday building, London and then latterly the international network
Feeling hungry whilst working on a weekend shift, he remembers being caught by the boss trying to cook his own food in the staff canteen.
Play the audio clip and view the transcript to learn more. A new window will open.Peter Wareham, originally worked in aircraft manufacture at Vickers Armstrong before being made redundant in 1958. Two years after an initial enquiry he joined the Post Office when new vacancies finally arose digging in cables.
He became an engineer and worked with the GPO for thirty years. Peter enjoyed the life and made the most of being outdoors in Dorset, however, as he recalls, occasionally things did go slightly awry.
Play the audio clip and view the transcript to learn more. A new window will open.
This curious artefact was worn like a pair of inverted goat horns on the heads of unfortunate telegraph operators.
Telegraph rooms were busy places with lots of bustle and noise, which made it difficult for operators to concentrate on listening to incoming messages. To help focus their attention these ear-trumpets were designed for them.
They were made of a light plastic, mounted on a band like a pair of headphones, but there were no electrics inside the cones. The thin end wedged into the ear and the fat end pointed towards the sound of the messages that were amplified down the funnel.
Unsurprisingly they didn't catch on and were only used by a few people or possibly never made it beyond the test phase. Some sacrifices were too great for even the most dedicated employee and looking that undignified was probably a step too far.
Alec Bonsall was attracted to telecoms as a schoolboy during the Second World War, when he drove around in his uncle's van, who was a maintenance engineer for the PO Telephones.
His interest was spurred on by his hobby as a radio pirate working with RAF surplus equipment sold off cheaply after the war. He joined The GPO as a Special Faults Investigation Officer during the late 1940s.
Some of the faults he was called out to investigate were far from routine and he remembers a curious incident involving a feather duster.
Play the audio clip and view the transcript to learn more. A new window will open.Pat Hastings joined the GPO in October 1946 where he worked for forty three years, becoming a Technical Officer.
Pat has been involved with many of the modern developments in telecommunications, from transatlantic telephone cables to satellite communications.
He was responsible for maintaining the trunk network earlier in his career and he remembers the vulnerability of overhead cabling in 1950s.
Play the audio clip and view the transcript to learn more. A new window will open.Alec Bonsall was attracted to telecommunications as a schoolboy during the Second World War, when he drove around in his uncle's van, who was a maintenance engineer for the PO Telephones.
His interest was spurred on by his hobby as a radio pirate working on RAF surplus equipment sold off cheaply after the war. He joined The GPO as a Special Faults Investigation Officer during the late 1940s.
He remembers some of the customers could be rather awkward but it sometimes paid not to argue.
Play the audio clip and view the transcript to learn more. A new window will open.Pat Hastings joined the GPO in October 1946 where he worked for forty three years. He found it was hard in the early years to get on in his career and there was a high level of rivalry between the ex-servicemen who were being integrated back into post-war society and the new recruits, however he found that beside the work there were some extra-curricular fringe benefits.
Play the audio clip and view the transcript to learn more. A new window will open.