No matter your interest – telecoms, history or memorabilia – this collection will hold something for you. It pays tribute to generations of individuals who helped shape telephony through its creation; from installing poles and burying cables, to designing and managing its technology.
This collection comprises wooden wall phones, candlestick phones and classic rotary dial telephones crafted of wood or candle wax; an operator switchboard; as well as two position Kellogg universal telephone exchange. Also included are line maps and directories.
History of Telecommunications
This collection covers the evolution of telecommunications from manual switching to automated systems and honors generations of men and women who erected poles, buried cables, designed and managed telecommunication technology and installed telephone sets into users’ homes and offices. Visitors can experience history first hand through interactive exhibits allowing them to touch, hold and operate equipment from various eras of telecommunications – recently we introduced QR codes at some exhibits which enable visitors to use smart phones to gain additional information about items on display.
Telephone Historical Centre collections show the immense possibilities created by Alexander Graham Bell’s invention for humanity. Telecommunications allows us to stay in contact with each other while exchanging valuable information such as weather reports, traffic updates and stock market updates. The museum features a diverse collection of telephones ranging from wooden wall phones and novelty models, through rotary dials, operator switchboards and complete two position Kellogg universal telephone exchanges. It also shows the evolution of mobile telephones from 1970’s car phones through modern cellular technology, offering visitors a unique viewing experience. Operated by Telephone Historical Centre Collections – an award-winning non-profit comprising active and retired telecom employees – the museum makes for a fun visit!
Telephones
No matter your background in communications technology or interest in communications itself, this collection offers something for everyone. Ranging from early telephones to the latest mobile phones and more modern models such as tablets or virtual reality phones – each piece showcases generations of hardworking telco workers who built poles, laid cables and designed and managed the technologies that made telecommunications possible.
Visitors to this museum will see working panel and crossbar electromechanical central office type switching systems, an impressive collection of rotary, candlestick and wooden wall-mount telephones from 1900 through today (including Princess Phones), novelty phones (such as Princess Phones), as well as numerous novelty phones such as Princess Phones. A large collection of red telephone boxes reminiscent of those seen along Britain’s roadsides since 1920 is also on view here.
This museum provides a working, self-guided exhibition on the history of communication technology. It includes working equipment such as a complete Strowger Exchange, 1920s switchboard, rotary dial phones and red telephone kiosks from BT’s last rollout – as well as its red kiosk collection from last rollout! Founded by Western Electric retiree Don Capehart and Rita Capehart (both Western Electric retirees), volunteers staff the museum; visitors can try their hand at being 1920s rotary dial operators or learn about its development from Alexander Graham Bell’s “Mr Watson, come here!” call to videophones! In addition, guided tours and educational programs can also be offered.
Switchboards
The museum provides visitors with an interactive experience of telephone technology’s history and its impact on society, through hands-on models and exhibits that illustrate its workings, as well as those responsible for its creation, development and maintenance.
This collection includes several operating operator switchboards which display how the system worked during its heyday, along with numerous reconstructed back-end systems and manual exchange buildings. A range of wall phones from early hand crank magneto phones to modern mobile smartphones are also on display as well as an extensive library that showcases one-of-a-kind telecom publications.
This museum could have easily turned into an inaccessible collection, appealing only to retired telephone technicians and their children, but instead has achieved something quite remarkable: entertaining without being silly, informative without becoming dull, surprising while remaining familiar.
Starting off as an initiative from retired employees of Edmonton D TEL, the Museum opened for business on December 3, 1987 in Old Strathcona neighborhood in Edmonton. Over time it relocated to its current home at Prince of Wales Armouries Heritage Centre in central Edmonton where it now operates as the oldest comprehensive telephone museum West of Mississippi with backend and operator switchboards dating from 1901 through 1970 in its collection.
