THE MELBOURNE TELEPHONE EXCHANGE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XVIII, Issue 5997, 5 February 1881, Page 7

THE MELBOURNE TELEPHONE EXCHANGE.

Oxly a small section of the community has the least idea of the extent to which the telephone has been brought into practical use intliiaoity. The great convenience it affords to business people has not been generally understood, and it may be of interest to many to learn that it is fast coming into common use. In America, telephones are found to be indispensable. In all the principal cities the warehouses and other business establislunents are in communication with each other, so that the clerks of one offie can without the least delay or trouble converse with the clerks of another, and bay, sell, or take orders, as the case may be, the labour required being no more than that of stepping to the instrument and asking and replying to questions. If, for instance, a customer enters a shop and desires to obtain any particular article which may not happen to be in stock, he may learn in the course of a few minutes whether the article is obtainable anywhere in the city. In the same way • any shopkeeper can in an in>tant apprise the police of the presence of a thief or suspected person, whose capture may be effected with all promptness ami speed. If wanted, a messenger can be at one's door night or day within a few minutes after touching a knob in the room, and he may deliver notes, invitations, circulars, light packages, Sec, or escort a lady or child to any place, and 'call for them if desired; bring children from school during a storm; take umbrellas, aterproofs, &c, to church or elseu'iero if needtd ; go for a physician, nurse, medicine friend, carriage, express, &c, at all hours.' Another ingenious contrivance is one which makes a burglar himself call a policeman to I arrest him when attempting to enter a building, whether occupied or not. The above, of bourse, is not all done by telephones ; but is merely instanced for the purpose of illustrating the extraordinary manner in which elcctreity may be applied to ordinary life. As a means of communicating lire alarms, electricity, it is known, has hren adopted with wonderful perfection. Buttons fixed upon telegraph and verandah posts, ■when pressed, will set the alarm bolls of everv fire brigade station ringing, whilst otlieV means arc provided for ascertaining the precise locality of the fire. In Boston and 3<!c\v York there arc many establishments in which if fires occur, the fires will signal themselves. This is done by a simple contrivance called the thennosfcil, which consists of an instrument containing mercury and two platinum vfires,- one above and the other below, and very close together. The heat of the fire anses the mercury to rise until it completes the contact between the two wires, and thus sets the alarm bells ringing at the nvL'radc stations. Melbourne has not advanced to this extent in the application of science to household life, bnt before long, it is hoped, great progress will be made in thatdireetion. In the meantime, much has been done in the establishment of the Melbourne Telephone Exchange Company, of which Mr. Byron Moore is the manager. Anyone walking down the western end of Collins-street cannot fail to notice the network of wires, which, carried On a large beam, seem to enter the roof of the Exchange building from all directions ; and he must, if of an enquiring turn of mind, wonder what necessity there is for them. A room on the top floor of the building is the central station of the company, and from there dirverge all parts of the city to the wires which connect every subscriber with the Exchange by telephone. At present there arc altogether about CO subscribers, Including the majority of the important commercial, banking, manufacturing and legal firms of the city, all of whom, by being in-communication with the Exchange, are in communication with each other. Every subscriber has a telephone fitted up in his office, and is furnished with a list of his brother subscribers, each of whom has a distinctive number. At the central office a process of switching is carried on, and if A., who is a merchant, desires to speak with his lawyer 8., all he has to do is to signal the central office that hedesires to be switched on to B. 's number. Jvo sooner is the request made than the " switching" is accomplished, and A. and B. may talk to each other as long as they please. Another illustration may be given. A person enters C.'s drapery establishment and makes a purchase, tendering in payment a cheque, the drawer's name beins; unknown to C. Whilst the articles are being -wrapped ■ap, C. signals to be "switched" onto the bank, and asks the manager, "If signature is known." He may thereupon the next moment receive a reply which would guide him as to the advisability of accepting the cheque or not. Instances of this character are quite sufficient to show what may be done by means of the telephone, and what amount of time and labour may be saved. The Exchange, «ince its establishment, has been found to work so well that the subscribers to it are daily increasing. In fact, a number of subscribers have positively declined to deal with houses who are not subscribers, owing to theunnessary delay and bother consequent upon their not being in communication by wire. There need be no appreusion as to the successful working of the telephone, for persons six miles apart can converse as freely and as audibly with each othor as if they were in the same room. The method of " switching" is about as simple a matter as can be conceived, -and is attended to entirely by a young lady. There is in the "switching' room a large board fixed perpendicularly,' capable of receiving the wires of a hundred subscribers. The front of the board shows on the top rows of little doors, corresponding in numbers with rows of pegs placed below. Each subscriber is known by these numbers, and is provided on the board with a door and peg. If, for example, subscriber Sixtco.ii dcairea to speaJ; with subscribes Sixty, he turns a handle attached to his telephone, which has the effect of dropping door Sixteen in the" switching" room. The lady in charge observes the signal, and asks Sixteen, through a telephone, " "What he van's?" She at once receives a reply that he wishes to speak ■with Sixty, whereupon the lady, by pressing a button, rings Sixty's bell in Sixty's office, and tells him that Sixteen wants to speak with mm. Sixty, to show he is ready for business, replies by turning the handle of his telephone and dropping door sixty in the "switching" room, thus info rming the lady that he has heard her call. The lady thereupon takes a connecting wire, at the ends of which are two brass keys, and sticking one upon plug Sixteen and the other upon plug Sixty completes the circuit between those two subscribers, who are then in a position to communicate. This actually takes longer to describe than it does to execute, for one firm in the city can be placed in uninterrupted communication with another in much less time than it takes to read this explanation of the method, oo far the wires have not been extended beyond a distance of six miles, the furthest limits reached beinj the Exhibition, the Apollo Candle Company, Kitchen & Sons, and Mr. tfyron Moore's private residence at Ascot Vale. - Arrangements are, however, being made for extending the system toToorak and ottier suburbs, where, in order to save the expease in wires, branch offices will be establisheo. One wire between the Central iixchange and each suburb will then be sufficient, for private wires can be carried out irom the branch exchange, and "switched" on to Melbourne wire wherever necessary, and so ou to every private wire running out n-oni the Central Exchange. As the .Exchange becomes better known it will be the more appreciated, and it may not be long before almost all places of business for miles are brought into telephonic communication with each other.—Age.