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The TEN Project - Researching Telephone Exchange Names

Started by Phonesrfun, October 28, 2009, 12:01:40 AM

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Adam

Old exchange names are fun!

Although I currently live 25 miles out of my original area, for the number of my C*NET exchange I picked the number of my first phone when I moved to Los Angeles in 1979, which was 213-383.

I have since determined, with the help of this cool web site http://www.thecentraloffice.com/ that number was served out of the Rampart Central Office and that 38 was DUnkirk.
Adam Forrest
Los Angeles Telephone - A proud part of the global C*Net System
C*Net 1-383-4820

Babybearjs

hey Bill, did they even heat to operators work room? it looks like everyones cold!
John

Phonesrfun

-Bill G

loblolly986

It appears the TEN Project is dead. The database was working six months ago when I was researching some exchange names, but in trying to use it again lately, http://tenproject.cloudapp.net/tensearch.aspx just results in a "server not found" message.

I had assumed http://www.trbo.org/pub/tenp/TENproject.html was the current home of the project's website, but it seems to be an unofficial mirror. The original site along with the rest of Robert Crowe's personal site, and the site of his company Searchlight Group, have apparently been dead for a few years based on looking them up in the Wayback Machine, as has the discussion group since Yahoo Groups shut down in 2020.

A shame, as not only did it make it easy to research the exchange names historically used in one's local area, but it was very useful to the collector for determining the area where a telephone was once in service based on its number card. Evidently Mr. Crowe is still around, now working for Google, if someone with the means and interest wanted to pursue contacting him about taking it over.

MMikeJBenN27


MMikeJBenN27

Didn't know your post was several years old.  Link no longer works.

Mike

SUnset2

It was working a few months ago.  It's a shame it's down.  I've referred to it from time to time, and contributed a few additions.
If anyone knows how to contact the site author, maybe we could get at least a static dump of it and provide it somewhere as a spreadsheet (maybe even here, if such attachments are allowed),

MMikeJBenN27

That's one of the ways that a printed volume is so much better than the Internet - it doesn't break down.

Mike

TelePlay

#53
Quote from: loblolly986 on September 19, 2023, 02:22:49 PMIt appears the TEN Project is dead.

"Unofficial Mirror?" site URL added to OP:

http://www.trbo.org/pub/tenp/TENproject.html


SUnset2

Quote from: TelePlay on September 20, 2023, 07:33:02 PM"Unofficial Mirror?" site URL added to OP:
http://www.trbo.org/pub/tenp/TENproject.html
Yes, that page is still there, but all the links from it are broken.  You can't access the database, access the discussion group or contact the host.

ka1axy

FWIW, Googling "telephone exchange names ##", where "" is a 2-digit prefix, returns what you might expect: a list of exchange names that match the prefix you entered...

loblolly986

Robert Crowe has pages on LinkedIn and X-née-Twitter if someone with access wants to try contacting him (the LinkedIn page lists his involvement with Searchlight Group and has the same photo that was on their website, so this is "our" Robert). He also has a presence on GitHub for software development related to his work at Google, though I'm not sure if one could directly contact him there.