Kansas City telephone exchange names

[username]

Does anyone know where I can find telephone exchange names for the Kansas City area from about the 1950s or 1960s?

I know DElmar was used in this area for 33- exchanges.  I am also sure that WYandotte was used in this area for 99- exchanges because it appears in Ma Bell's officially recommended exchange names guide from 1955.  But many cities deviated from the Ma Bell guide for certain exchanges, and I am sure Kansas City had a few.

[Cyclops]

Does anyone know where I can find telephone exchange names for the Kansas City area from about the 1950s or 1960s?

I know DElmar was used in this area for 33- exchanges.  I am also sure that WYandotte was used in this area for 99- exchanges because it appears in Ma Bell's officially recommended exchange names guide from 1955.  But many cities deviated from the Ma Bell guide for certain exchanges, and I am sure Kansas City had a few.

Ha! Somewhere I have a phone book from 69. I'm guessing they would be listed there. Offhand I remember 93X being Westport, 36X being Emerson, 52X being Jackson, 76X being South, 53X was Jefferson... after that, I'll have to find the old phone book... AKP? Highlander?

[DeadendLafayette]

Does anyone know where I can find telephone exchange names for the Kansas City area from about the 1950s or 1960s?

I know DElmar was used in this area for 33- exchanges.  I am also sure that WYandotte was used in this area for 99- exchanges because it appears in Ma Bell's officially recommended exchange names guide from 1955.  But many cities deviated from the Ma Bell guide for certain exchanges, and I am sure Kansas City had a few.

Bad scan. !955:

[Tosspot]

Neat.

Westport/West Plaza landlines are often 931. My dad's was for twenty years. My workplace on the Plaza is 753 - although the phone company is more loose and free with assigning a 753 to the Westport area and so forth now as well.


By the way... that commercial... "for better living now and better value later, call standard improvement company at Westport One, 7510. Seeing as how that commercial ran over the course of years through my childhood, it's ingrained.

[omenapt]

WEird!  I can still remember my phone number from 1966 in Cleveland Heights , Ohio  YE2-2182
(Yellowstone)

When we moved here, it was JA3 XXXX  !

[omenapt]

What i meant to say was "Weird, i never new there was a Yellowstone here in KC as well as Cleveland!"

[username]

Thank you!  Great image. 

[Sportster]

Westport One - Seventy One Hundred.

Name that number!

Sportster
...its the standard

[Tosspot]

Westport One - Seventy One Hundred.

Name that number!

Sportster
...its the standard

I mentioned it upthread though not by name - Standard Improvement Company. I guess it pays to run the same commercial repeatedly for thirty years.

[KCKev]

Still remember my Grandma's number at 17th st and Washington

Grand 1-1570

[butter_breath]

Growing up on 20th Quincy my number was chestnut 1 5920 back in 1958. My grand mother that lived at 24th and Quincy was Wabash 1. My other grandmother at 18th and Spruce was Jackson 3.

[DanCa]

Neat.

Westport/West Plaza landlines are often 931. My dad's was for twenty years. My workplace on the Plaza is 753 - although the phone company is more loose and free with assigning a 753 to the Westport area and so forth now as well.


By the way... that commercial... "for better living now and better value later, call standard improvement company at Westport One, 7510. Seeing as how that commercial ran over the course of years through my childhood, it's ingrained.

You forgot the "boom ba boom ba boom" part! I remember that from when I was a kid, but I don't think anyone used the name prefixes by the '70s when I remember this commercial 

[aknowledgeableperson]

after that, I'll have to find the old phone book... AKP? Highlander?

I have nothing.  Didn't most of the names used follow the names of the area using the prefix or the street the location was centered on?

[dangerboy]

y'all are really showing your ages....

[aknowledgeableperson]

If you are lucky someone will be saying the same thing to you 30 years from now.

[dangerboy]

If you are lucky someone will be saying the same thing to you 30 years from now.

yeah, when i talk about growing up in a house with a land line...

[mlind]

yeah, when i talk about growing up in a house with a land line...

I remember when some people still had party lines because they were cheaper.

In KCK (as a kid), my number was Finley 1-7433.  My grandparents had Drexel 6299 and then Drexel 1-6299 from the 1940's until 1989.  I don't remember when they added the '1'. The prefixes were definitely attached to geographic areas.  I'm so old that remember when my address was Kansas City, 2, Kansas.  No zipcode.

[KCFutbol]

I remember when some people still had party lines because they were cheaper.

In KCK (as a kid), my number was Finley 1-7433.  My grandparents had Drexel 6299 and then Drexel 1-6299 from the 1940's until 1989.  I don't remember when they added the '1'. The prefixes were definitely attached to geographic areas.  I'm so old that remember when my address was Kansas City, 2, Kansas.  No zipcode.

I'll give you some company. TErrace 3545, Omaha, 24, Nebraska.

[towncow]

You forgot "Standard Bom-ba-bom-ba-bom Improvement Company"

HIland 4-1149

[enough]

ok, i can play, too.  je(fferson) 1395.  va(lentine) 5247.  then, about 1956 or 57, va(lentine) 1-5247.  kansas city 2, missouri.  all-digit dialing?  i've forgotten when that came in.  sometime in the mid to late 60s?

oh -- and it was westport (1-) 71 hundred.  quaint of standard (aaawk) (dum-da-dum-da-dum) im-prove-ment comp-nee to hold on to that jingle after all these years.

(and i'm nowhere close to being a fossil.)