Really Different Bakelite Handset

[Doug Rose]

Made by Dictograph. I have never seen anything like it. I love the lines, feels good in your hand

Plus it works!!..Doug

[MaximRecoil]

They used Dictograph units on Bewitched at Darrin's place of employment, but I don't know if any of them were old enough to have a handset like yours. The ones I remember from the show had a handset that sort of looked like a cross between an F and G type WE handset, like in the attached screenshot.

I'm not even entirely sure what those Dictograph things could do. I believe they were used for intraoffice communications, at least, that's how they were used on Bewitched. But they also had multi-line WE phones in their offices which I'd think could be used for the same thing.

I don't know if the Dictophones could make regular phone calls or not. I doubt it, because the ones on the show, and most of the ones you see if you do an online image search for them, don't have a dial. Plus, in the 1960s, I don't think you were allowed to connect your own phone to a Bell System phone line. As far as I know, the Carterfone decision in 1968 was the beginning of the end of that rule (allowing the connection of acoustically-coupled devices), but I don't think it was firmly established that you could directly plug in your own phone until the mid 1970s.

[MMikeJBenN27]

Made by Dictograph. I have never seen anything like it. I love the lines, feels good in your hand

Plus it works!!..Doug

Great find Doug!  Never seen one like that either.

Mike