Kellogg Redbar not getting dial tone to Receiver

[Nick in Manitou]

Poplar1,
I believe you are correct about the door-bell-type button being momentary.

On page 6 of the document  from 1947 at: http://www.telephonecollectors.info/strombergcarlson/selectophone/PDF/KG_1947_BLTN_815_MN_SELECTOPHONE.pdf , in a section entitled, "A Brief Description of Select-O-Phone, The Private Automatic Telephone System", I found the following statement which is the first statement I have been able to find that seems to talk about the door-bell-type button that appears on many of the Redbars.
''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''
"7. Party Line Service
   ...To ring a station on your own party line, merely press the ringing button; the dial need not be operated. Conversations between stations on a party line are as private as between stations on single station lines."
''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''
So I guess that it just rings the bells of the phones in the system that are on the same party line circuit that it is on. (I am making a guess here as I am really not very familiar with how telephone systems are put together.)

I assume that if I knew where to look for it (and I was better at spotting things on a schematic), it must show up on the Select-O-Phone schematics.

[RB]

just my 2 cents worth.
I believe you need to also crank the phone "if it has one" to signal other parties???
I do not know that there is any circuitry inside a redbar, that can generate a ring signal???
Yes, the button is momentary.
My understanding, is
1.crank phone, operator answers.
2. hold button and crank phone, rings party phones, not the op
but, i cud be wrong...it has happened.