What Do You Think? Is It Real?

[Fabius]

http://tinyurl.com/l6q8ugn

This would have to be seen and touched to make a final judgment.

Against it is the following:

Black reverse on a supposedly early sign.

Letters don't seem to have sharp edges though that could be from a low resolution photo.

Never seen this sign before which may or may not mean something. I've seen a lot of signs but by no means have I seen them all.

Notice it shows that the seller is in Birdsboro, Pennsylvania, same town that is on the sign.

What do you all think?

[Phonesrfun]

I know almost nothing about early signs, but just for the heck of it, I am offering a couple of my observations:

1.  Seems odd that the back of the sign is more beat up than the front.
2.  The shape of the Bell does not seem to be exactly the shape of other bells, but I could be wrong.  Was this phone company one of the Bell System companies?  Did independent companies use the Bell System Bell as part of their logo to advertise local and long distance calling?
3.  The mounting holes have metal grommets.  Did older signs have those?  I see them in reproduction signs and I have always wondered if the older ones had them.

My questions probably point to how little I know about these.

[Scotophor]

I have also only seen the metal grommets in mounting holes of reproduction signs, and would like to know if any authentic vintage signs (not just telephone-related) had them.

[Fabius]

I have also only seen the metal grommets in mounting holes of reproduction signs, and would like to know if any authentic vintage signs (not just telephone-related) had them.

Grommets where used in original old signs. I took a quick look at my signs and about a third still had their grommets. Here's a picture of a '21 Bell hubcap with its gromments

[jsowers]

Was this phone company one of the Bell System companies?  Did independent companies use the Bell System Bell as part of their logo to advertise local and long distance calling?

Bill, I did some poking around and Conestoga Tel and Tel was part of Bell of Pennsylvania, I think. This morning I found and bought this unusual matchbook cover that features a nice dark blue 500 and an ivory 554 and it's from Conestoga Tel and Tel from Birdsboro, PA. Pictures attached below.

It's nice to find something you want doing research for something else. I have all kinds of Bell System matchbooks, but I've never seen this one before.

[Fabius]

Interesting find with the picture of the 500 set. And great how you found it doing research on a related topic.

[Phonesrfun]

The shape of the bell on Tom's original picture is an awful looking bell as compared to the more familiar bell shape in jsower's photo of the sign with grommets.  Makes me wonder if they just did a bad job of reproducing the bell in the original sign or if it is a reproduction with lousy artwork?

[Sargeguy]

I saw that and wondered the same thing.  The sign is pictured on page 427 of Ron Knappen's payphone book.  Would a small, semi-independent telco have contracted separately to have a batch of it's own signs made?  Would that account for the differences?

[Fabius]

The shape of the bell on Tom's original picture is an awful looking bell as compared to the more familiar bell shape in jsower's photo of the sign with grommets.  Makes me wonder if they just did a bad job of reproducing the bell in the original sign or if it is a reproduction with lousy artwork?

The original sign with grommets is mine.

[Phonesrfun]

Sorry about that.  I see now I blew that.