20 Things Phone Companies Did to 1950s Switchboard Operators That Are Illegal Today

🔔Subscribe to Chloe on the Clock for the documented record of what women workers endured, one countdown at a time.    / @chloeontheclock   In 1950, roughly one in every 13 working American women wore a telephone headset. She was the voice on the line, the human being who connected a stranger to a doctor, to family, to help in the dark. And the phone company had decided that voice was theirs. This is the documented record of what the Bell System and the independent phone companies did to the 1950s switchboard operator. She was screened for the right voice before she was hired. She was wired to the board by a cord she couldn't unplug. Her seconds were counted, her words were scripted, and a supervisor could listen to any call, at any time, without ever telling her. Most of it would be illegal today. We count down 20 rules, from the dress code on a floor no customer ever saw, to the "voice with a smile" she performed for every caller, to the color line that kept Black women out of the job entirely, to the case one Southern Bell operator carried all the way to victory. Did a woman in your family work a switchboard? Tell us the one thing she was never allowed to say. #History #WomensHistory #1950s 📝 Link to sources: https://docs.google.com/document/d/16...