Claude S. Fischer 
America Calling [EPUB ebook] 
A Social History of the Telephone to 1940

The telephone looms large in our lives, as ever present in modern societies as cars and television. Claude Fischer presents the first social history of this vital but little-studied technology—how we encountered, tested, and ultimately embraced it with enthusiasm. Using telephone ads, oral histories, telephone industry correspondence, and statistical data, Fischer’s work is a colorful exploration of how, when, and why Americans started communicating in this radically new manner.


Studying three California communities, Fischer uncovers how the telephone became integrated into the private worlds and community activities of average Americans in the first decades of this century. Women were especially avid in their use, a phenomenon which the industry first vigorously discouraged and then later wholeheartedly promoted. Again and again Fischer finds that the telephone supported a wide-ranging network of social relations and played a crucial role in community life, especially for women, from organizing children’s relationships and church activities to alleviating the loneliness and boredom of rural life.


Deftly written and meticulously researched,
America Calling adds an important new chapter to the social history of our nation and illuminates a fundamental aspect of cultural modernism that is integral to contemporary life.



The telephone looms large in our lives, as ever present in modern societies as cars and television. Claude Fischer presents the first social history of this vital but little-studied technology—how we encountered, tested, and ultimately embraced it with en

قائمة المحتويات

List of Figures

List of Tables

Preface


CHAPTER I

Technology and Modern Life


CHAPTER 2

The Telephone in America


CHAPTER 3

Educating the Public


CHAPTER 4

The Telephone Spreads: National Patterns


CHAPTER 5

The Telephone Spreads: Local Patterns


CHAPTER 6

Becoming Commonplace


CHAPTER 7

Local Attachment, I89D-I940


CHAPTER 8

Personal Calls, Personal Meanings


CHAPTER 9

Conclusion


APPENDIX A

Bibliographic Essay


APPENDIX B

Statistical Analyses of Telephone and Automobile Distribution


APPENDIX C

Telephone Subscription among Iowa Farmers, 1924


APPENDIX D

Summary of Expenditure Studies by Household Income

or Occupation


APPENDIX E

The 1918-1919 Cost of Living Study


APPENDIX F

Who Had the Telephone When?


APPENDIX G

Analysis of Advertisement Data


APPENDIX H

Statistical Analyses for Chapter 7


Notes

Bibliography

Index

Photograph section follows page 153

عن المؤلف

Claude S. Fischer is Professor of the Graduate School in Sociology, and the author of To Dwell among Friends: Personal Networks in Town and City (1982) and The Urban Experience (1984).