What is the best looking North American rotary wall telephone ever made?

[jsowers]

My favorite is also the WE 554. What some call a flat slab I call sleek looking, even in black. I grew up with one grandmother having an AE50 in her hallway and the other grandmother had a black WE 554 in her kitchen. The 554 was then and still is my favorite. I've had several on the wall in my garage, basement and kitchen for over 30 years and I still like how they look and how they sound.

One factor in the 554's favor is how I can easily use them on the modular wall jacks in my house and change colors if I like. I started out with a moss green 554 in the kitchen and switched to ivory several years ago. I do own a black AE50 and it's on display with my phone collection, but I wouldn't dream of trying to use it with a modular wall jack. For me, part of the beauty of the 554 is being able to use it.

[AL_as_needed]

My two cents:

I also really like the classic WE 554. When polished and with a black finger wheel, I feel they look their best. Not space age or art deco (354 a close second), but very much a 60s minimalist piece like most black slabs..... I mean "art".   

[twocvbloke]

For me, I think the 354 in black (not necessarily with chromed shiny bits either) is the nicest looking, quite an elegant design...

[19and41]

The AE 50 is my favorite also.  I've always liked the looks of it and it's desktop counterpart.  Of the WE wall phones, my favorite has been the Trimline.  It has more appeal for me for it's layout and ergonomics than any particular appearance aspect.

[MaximRecoil]

For me, a black 554 is the wall phone, and the phone, for that matter. My earliest memories date from mid-1978 when I was 3½ years old, and that's what we had on our kitchen wall. I remember standing on a chair to reach it. My aunt had one on her wall too (and it was the only phone in her house; she continued to lease it from the phone company until 1996), and most everyone else I knew had one on their wall too, sometimes in a color other than black. My grandmother is the only exception I can think of; she had a rotary Trimline on her kitchen wall. I was fascinated by that phone when I was a kid due to its small dial on the handset instead of the base, the moving finger stop, and the light-up dial. I viewed it as a novelty phone though, with the 554 being a "real phone".

I was plenty familiar with the 500 too, as we had a couple of those in addition to the 554; one in the living room on an end table and one in my parent's room on my mother's bedside stand; both black. Lots of other people had them too. But regardless of that, I still gravitated toward the 554. I loved the look of it and how it was solidly mounted to the wall. It just seemed like a more serious piece of equipment than a desk phone.

In 1999 I acquired the house I grew up in and the old modular wall jack in the kitchen was still there, the same one that was there when I was a kid; complete with the Bell System logo stamped in the lower right-hand corner of it. I stuck my wimpy Sony IT-B3 phone on it for the time being, but started searching for a 554. That was 2 years before I got a computer / internet access, so I went to the library to use the internet there. I found a website of a phone refurbishment place that had 554s for sale and came home and gave them a call. I told them I wanted a black one with a chrome-plated metal hook switch, a clear plastic finger dial, modular, and it had to be a Western Electric and say "Bell System Property Not For Sale" on it; in other words, a phone exactly like the one that was in the kitchen when I was a kid. So a 554 has been on my kitchen wall since 1999 (and from 1960 when my father originally bought this house, to 1986 when my parents unfortunately gave it back to the phone company and replaced it with a chintzy Trimline knockoff from Kmart).

[oldguy]

Like you MaximRecoil, I have always been fascinated with the moving fingerstop too. It's the only phone I know of that has a moving fingerstop.

[AE_Collector]

A very clever way to reduce the size of the dial!

Terry

[andre_janew]

Didn't AE make something similar to the Trimline that also had the dial in the handset and a moveable finger stop?

[rdelius]

AE made the type 980? Styleline .I thought they were not as well made.Somewhat larger than the Trimline. Different handset connectors also

[jsowers]

AE made the type 980? Styleline .I thought they were not as well made.Somewhat larger than the Trimline. Different handset connectors also

Yes, it had a movable fingerstop. Also the orange WE buttset used the same type dial as the Trimline.

[AE_Collector]

AE980 is the handset (whether Rotary or Touch Call)
AE981 is the desk base
AE982 is the wall base

Terry