[ohples]

I saw this movie and was interested at the tech that climb the telephone pool to hookup the transmitter.

Was this a common thing back in the day? Did random poles have equipment that non-telephone company people could hook into for remote use like this? I can think of many different use cases for this in the days before widespread mobile telephones.

I'm pretty familiar with telephone history and technology but can't seem to find references to these or what they where called. Anyone have any pointers?

[b112]

This was the 30s, with phone lines decades? older, so would they even be waterproof? I guess they could use asbestos and wax or something, but this was before wide scale platic.

Rubber coated maybe?

I guess my point is, that you could tap into the line without breaking it. And rubber coating on a wire after a decade in the sun, would have lots of cracks?

Again, these wires would be a decade or more old. 1900 tech? Would they even be coated?

Few people even had phones. Party lines for a whole rural town were common. And you could separate lines with spacers.

Anyhow. I think they just tapped into the wire.

Maybe they just slapped some liquid rubber after tapping?

[ohples]

It looked like there was a box on the pole they were hooking into made for this purpose.