[The following was published in the March 1952 issue of Pacific Telephone Magazine. It provides an interesting look at how early phones were valued at the time and is rather prophetic regarding collectible phones today]

“The newest thing in telephone sets isn’t a sleek 500-type handset or even the faraway gleam in the eye of a Bell Laboratories researcher. It is Granny’s old wooden wallset.
Yes, sir, it’s that old cumbersome but dependable telephone, encased in a wooden cabinet which once hung on her kitchen wall. Nowadays people in Southern California are hanging the cabinets (minus all operating circuits, of course) right out in the living rooms of their new homes. They are objects d’art, they say. You see, some fine hardwoods, such as oak, walnut, and birch, went into the construction of the cabinets. Antique shops are selling a refinished wallset cabinet for- hold your breath- $35. “As is” they are only $22.50.
The younger brother of Granny’s wooden wallset, the deskset model 1905, is an antique item, too, with a little different twist. With the glossy finish restored to its outer jacket of nickel plate and wired as a lamp it carries a $15 price tag.
“Sakes alive,” said Granny when we told her, “I was glad enough just to trade in those old dust catchers for a new handset.”
And who knows? Perhaps 50 years hence people will be searching antique shops for 500-type handsets. They will make such quaint ash trays.”