It’s odd to think about certain bits of technology that were once common in your life and now essentially no longer exist at all. This is, I suppose, a byproduct of aging, and it’s the sort of thing that happens gradually enough that we tend not to notice it until it just kind of pops into our head, unbidden, like a missionary at the door. But unlike a missionary at the door, you can’t just turn the hose on these realizations, at least not easily. The one that popped into my head today was the realization that novelty landline phones, specifically ones made to look like cars, are pretty much extinct.
That’s right! The other kind of car phone! These were once A Thing!
That also got me wondering if there were any Volkswagen Beetle-shaped novelty phones, because those seem pretty obvious to do, though I can’t recall ever seeing one. Usually, I think novelty phones tended to be generic-ish sports car, something between a Corvette and a Porsche 911 and a bar of soap.
It’s probably worth talking about why these novelty telephones became a thing, and why they did when they did. Novelty phones started to really become a thing in the mid-to-late 1980s. It may seem strange that they weren’t a thing before that, because there’s really no technological reason why landline phones couldn’t have been built with fun plastic cases long before.
But the reason they didn’t exist before the 1980s, specifically 1983, was for strange politico-economic reasons. Specifically, prior to the 1980s, nobody actually owned their telephones; they were rented from the phone company. AT&T/Bell System, who had essentially a monopoly on telephony in America at the time, would claim that third-party phones could damage their lines, so they did not make it easy for anyone looking to have a custom phone.
If you really wanted a fancy phone, the Bell System would give you some options you could buy/rent, like these from 1976 that featured a Mickey Mouse phone, a few nostalgia-focused fancy models, and a couple more modern designs:
Really, though, that was it! And by far most people just used whatever basic phones the company would lease them. But then Ma Bell got broken up by an antitrust lawsuit from the Justice Department, and in 1982 people could finally own their own phones.
This all seems so weird, in hindsight. Leasing a phone? What the hell?
Anyway, after the Bell System was broken up into many smaller companies and phone ownership became a thing, companies started to make all kinds of novelty landline phones. You know those Garfield phones that keep washing up on that French beach because they fell off a container ship in the ’80s? Those were a product of this explosion of novelty phones.
At the same time, there were big strides being made in consumer electronics, so the combination of cheap new tech and a pent-up demand for silly phones meant that there were so many of these cheap novelty phones around, including many shaped by cars:
There really were a ton of these things. Some would be promotional giveaway kinds of things from gas stations or auto parts stores, and they would tend to be really flimsy and cheap-feeling. While touch-tone dialing was the standard in the 1980s, some of these phones would be super cheap and, while having a numeric keypad like a touch-tone phone, those buttons would only produce clicking sounds like an old rotary phone did, because the hardware to produce the dual tones that DTMF (dual tone multi frequency) dialing required cost a few pennies more.
Okay, back to my initial question: why have I never seen a VW Beetle cheap landline phone?
Considering how incredibly popular the Beetle was (and, really, still is) in the toy world, you would think there would have been phones that looked like one of the most easily identifiable cars ever built!
I mean, there were, it turns out, but somehow I don’t recall ever encountering one, which is weird to me. I’ve only managed to find two examples online so far.
First, this cheaper-looking one:
That looks like it’s based on a pretty early Beetle; I think it has either an oval or split window, which would make it a pre-’57 car. The other one seems like a fancier model, complete with its own wooden stand:
I suspect there must be more Beetle-phones out there, but I’m still a little baffled by their relative rarity compared to Corvette phones and Porsche phones and Ferrari phones, but I guess in a phone, people were looking for speed and status?
Who knows. These are all such relics of an extremely specific time in history, one that I think is more interesting that appears at first glance, too. And, they’re all essentially useless now. Even my old ’70s and ’80s computers and video game consoles I can still at least use, in some capacity. But an old landline? I haven’t had landline phone service in, oh, a decade.
You can pull about 24V out of a phone jack, though! I made a little reading lamp using that, once. I think the phone company hates that.
“Leasing a phone? What the hell?”
Me: What the hell? TIL
“The other one seems like a fancier model, complete with its own wooden stand”
Whoa! I’m pretty sure I used to have that one…am may still have it in storage
My Dodge Shadow phone from the 80s still resides in my garage
I had the black one when I was a kid because I was obsessed with VWs. But I didn’t use it for long because it was a terrible phone being very bulky and with poor sound quality. But it sure did look cool!
I’m surprised no one mentioned the “cordless” landlines phones!
Finally freedom from the landline cord!
A cordless landline would make a perfect car shaped novelty phone, something sleek like a lotus 11 that could be sized & shaped to comfortably fit in your hand
57 Chevy phones were popular
Etsy literally teems with old car phones including Beetles. Saw what’s advertised as a ‘67 Beetle phone that looked pretty good, but listed for $117. Yikes.
Back when America shopped in malls you could always find car-shaped phones in Spencer’s Gifts. Usually not far from the dancing beer and soda cans.
“That’s right! The other kind of car phone! These were once A Thing!”
Jason, it’s a sad day when your 99.99% accuracy in automotive knowledge (points deducted for observing maintenance details) takes a hit.
That’s a Beetle, not a Thing. You should know better. Shame.
Well not a lot of landlines left. And Beetle has a patent on the Beetle so have to pay for that. No one has a patent on a random football. I was trying to increase circulation at the Tallahassee Democrat and thought a FSU Newspaper Tube would help. But copy right was $15,000 design was $5,000 and NCAA wanted 60% would require selling the Newspaper Tube for the equivalent of a new car sort of made it unattainable.
A nice feature of those Bell desk phones, you could use them as weapons. Stout as a baseball bat!
But less reach
I had a 26 year career in what is now Verizon. Leasing a phone was an option that went away with the breakup of the Bell system, but lingered on grandfathered accounts.
That’s basically the cell phone model now. “Free” phones are just lease-to-own with a fancy name.
We have a Get Smart shoe phone.
We use it when the power goes out and our digital wireless base station dies.
…I asked you not to tell me that…
You didn’t 86 it?
Really once you let Penelec know power is out who you gonna call? The pizza place who’s oven has gone out?
…I asked you not to tell me that…
Sometimes those leased phones were hardwired into the wall (which I guess would explain the installation fee mentioned in that ad for the fancy phones). Back in the late ’70s when my parents were moving out of an apartment, Dad called the phone company to close the account, and the representative gave him the address where he could drop off the phone. The only problem? Yep, it was hardwired. Dad tried repeatedly to explain to the representative that he could not unplug the phone from the wall, but the representative was very insistent that the phone had to be unplugged and returned to a specific location. After much back-and-forth about whether or not the phone could be unplugged, Dad finally hung up, and proceeded to yank the phone out of the wall. Problem solved.
We never had car-shaped phones, but I did have a Snoopy phone (cute, but a very awkward shape to hold for a long conversation). Since Dad worked in the pickle industry, someone gave him a phone shaped like a giant pickle; he eventually took it to work and had it installed as an extension in his office.
The electronics to do the DTMF tones were cheap, it was the phone companies charging extra for using tone over pulse that made people keep the selector on P and not T.
I had a novelty space shuttle phone in that era that had cool hold music built in. I forget what song it was, but it was appropriately spacey.
I had a “candlestick” phone with a round touch-tone dial to mimic a rotary for most of high school. I put a really long cord on it to be able to walk around while talking.. I actually preferred it to the regular receiver
A friend had a NASCAR phone, though I don’t recall which driver it was (I know it wasn’t Earnhardt), but back in the early 90s I found one at a yard sale that looked vaguely Porsche 924 in the front and 928 in the back. I was so excited for it until I plugged it in and found out it didn’t work.
I have a Batmobile™ phone from the WB catalog circa late 80’s(?)
https://www.ebay.com/itm/336576336668
I have one. If I ever go to a Galpin meetup, Jason can have it.