WE 1970s Americana phone

[stopthemachine]

I've been meaning to ask about the 1970s Americana phone (separate receiver wall phone--found in both rotary and touch tone).

They're definitely a nod to their own phone from nearly a half century before, but does anyone know if they produced these phones with any of the same parts at all?  Did they use up any old receivers?  Did they use the same "molds" as the original?  Anyone have any ideas? 

Just curious--I think they're cool phones, but of course, they usually go for some good money. 

Dan

[jsowers]

The Americana is from 1980. Paul's site says "rotary only" and I have never seen a touch-tone version of it. There is a touch-tone version of the Country Junction. The parts used on the Americana and Country Junction phones were (I hate to say it) cheap junk when compared with the inner workings of a 500 set. This was the 1980s and they used lots of plastic. The dials are flimsy and the hookswitches break. The Country Junction handsets are very poorly designed and break when dropped. For what it cost, which I think was about $300 new, the Americana could have had a lot better insides. The wood part is beautiful and it displays nicely, but as a phone it's only average.

I don't think they re-used anything on these phones. It might have been better had they done that. But they didn't have any spare parts that old in 1980.

I own one with a broken hookswitch--one of the "ears" is completely broken off. Anyone have a spare Americana hookswitch?

The Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, MI sold these phones at one time. Many of them have a plaque on them stating that.

[rdelius]

No parts were interchangable with old parts. This was an expensive telephone when it was introduced $500.00+?
Robby

[stopthemachine]

Oh!  Yes, you're right--it was the Country Junction sets that were rotary or TT. 

Yes, they do display nicely--I guess it was my own wishful thinking that the phones would reuse some of their older supply of phone parts.  Sigh. 

[Adam]

Does anybody who's ever had one of these things open, know:  Is the "rotary style" touch-tone pad part-compatible with a normal rotary dial?  In other words, will one of these "rotary style" touch-tone pads mount nicely and cleanly in a 500 set?

(Don't know why you'd want to, I was just curious...)

[paul-f]

The 73-type dial is about the same size as a #8 dial, so the closest fit is a Princess set.  The plastic mounting brackets are thicker than on the #8 so some mechanical tinkering is needed.

  http://www.telephonecollectors.info/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_details&gid=2392&Itemid=2

The 500 requires a 4" dial, so a filler would be needed.

The 73-type dial is a bit too large to fit a 5302.

[JimH]

I heard somewhere that right before they stopped making the "Americana" set, the factory made a limited run of touch-tone versions just for the employees.  Apparantley these are rare and could be worth some money.  Funny thing about the cost of these...I have a price list from about 1980 and it cost $472!  And it clearly states that you are only buying the "housing", and that the inner parts remained property of the Bell System! When the Bell System broke up, they knew it would be impossible for the "innards police" to go around and collect guts from Design Line telephones, so they just let everyone have their inside parts.  How nice of them!

[paul-f]

Several of the Design Line sets were marketed as rotary only or touch tone only.

Since it was obviously possible to mount either dial in most sets, enterprising employees in the factory and distribution houses occasionally made the non-marketed version for Pioneer fundraisers, gifts, special events or just for fun.

For example...

[Jim Stettler]

I heard somewhere that right before they stopped making the "Americana" set, the factory made a limited run of touch-tone versions just for the employees.  Apparantley these are rare and could be worth some money.  Funny thing about the cost of these...I have a price list from about 1980 and it cost $472!  And it clearly states that you are only buying the "housing", and that the inner parts remained property of the Bell System! When the Bell System broke up, they knew it would be impossible for the "innards police" to go around and collect guts from Design Line telephones, so they just let everyone have their inside parts.  How nice of them!

Around here (Mountain Bell territory). They charged $10.00 for the guts @ break-up. Many consumers got upset and turned in their phones. Phone center employees could buy the returned design lines  for $10.00 each.

The Employees also took home phone center phones to try. At break-up they got to keep WE phones for free. Many Phone center employess ended up with clear trimlines.

Jim