if you'd like to make a call please hang up and try again if you need help stay on the line and a hacker will assist you shortly the telephone keeps ringing so i ripped it off the wall i cut myself while shaving now i can't make a call we couldn't get much worse but if they could they would but the best expect the worst i hope that's understood one day let's go so We'll be right back. 
We'll be right back. 
And a very good evening to everybody. 
The program is Off the Hook. 
Emmanuel Goldstein here with you on this Wednesday evening. 
Joined tonight by Kyle. 
Hi. 
And over in Skypeland, we have Rob T. Firefly. 
Good evening. 
We have Gila. 
Good evening. 
And we have Alex. 
Good evening. 
Who apparently is in space. 
All right. 
We have a special guest that's going to be joining us in just a couple of minutes. 
But first, some rather disturbing news that we're just becoming aware of involving our friends over at the Tesla Science Center out in Shoreham, Long Island. 
I'm going to read a notice that was sent out earlier today. 
As many of you are aware, our beloved Tesla Science Center at Wardenclyffe Laboratory was struck by a serious fire last night. 
While the fire was largely contained, occasional flare-ups occurred. 
There was one today. 
In fact, local fire departments remained diligently on the site to manage the situations. 
Over 100 firefighters from 11 departments responded to the blaze, demonstrating extraordinary courage and determination throughout the night. 
To these heroes, we owe a debt of gratitude beyond words. 
We are immensely grateful for their commitment and bravery. 
Given the ongoing activity, we strongly urge everyone to avoid visiting the site for your safety and to allow emergency services to operate unimpeded. 
We promise to keep you informed through regular updates on our website and social media channels. 
Of course, we'll be keeping people updated on this radio program as well. 
The full extent of the damage is yet to be determined. 
In the coming days, our site engineer, historical architect, and structural engineer, along with Suffolk County Police Department, the Brookhaven Town Fire Marshal, and the county's Department of Fire, Rescue, and Emergency Services will conduct a thorough assessment. 
Their insights will be crucial in shaping our ongoing plans to restore and rebuild this historic landmark. 
It brings a sense of relief to share that the structural integrity of the building, dating back to 1901, seems to have withstood the ordeal. 
This resilience is a testament to its original robust construction and durability. 
We recognize the profound emotional impact this incident has had on our community and on our supporters from around the world. 
Rest assured, our commitment to transparency remains steadfast. 
We'll provide accurate, timely information countering any misinformation that may arise. 
It is also important to note that while we were poised to begin a significant renovation and restoration project, construction had not yet commenced, sparing us from additional complexities at this stage. 
For ongoing updates and verified information, visit the website at www.teslasciencecenter.org. 
Your support and understanding in these challenging times are invaluable. 
Together, we will navigate this crisis and emerge stronger, honoring the legacy of Nikola Tesla and the spirit of innovation, determination, and resiliency that this center embodies. 
And, you know, I just got to say personally, it's on the eve of Thanksgiving to have such a horrible thing happen to such an amazing place that has just been the focal point for bringing people together, teaching about Tesla, about technology, this real enthusiasm. 
And I know that is not going to die. 
It's just got a little bit harder. 
But, boy, that was a gut punch. 
I don't think any of us needed. 
I feel the same way. 
The heart goes out to everyone there. 
And I know that the site and the project itself, as far as restoration and the future, is in good hands. 
They're really dedicated people that care very much about creating an institution and educational and historic facility there. 
So this is, I think, all the more reason why restoring it and getting it as safe and accessible and usable as possible is important. 
All right. 
Rob, go ahead. 
Yeah. 
The folks from the Tesla Science Center have always been so dedicated to what they're doing. 
They've communicated with us for, you know, on many occasions. 
They've shown up at Hope. 
They've spoken at multiple Hope conferences. 
You might have seen them in the merchandise area if you were there. 
And they just, it's, what they're doing is so important and so wonderful and preserving such an important piece of local history. 
And it is such a shame that something like this would happen to them. 
But, again, I have complete faith in the spirit behind it and the folks who work there. 
And, yeah, they will rebuild. 
They will recover from this. 
And, yeah, throw them some support if you can because this is really just amazingly important. 
And just keep checking that website for updates. 
We'll certainly have more about that next week. 
All right. 
Well, last week you might recall that we told the story of Ron and Mary Knappen of Galesville, Wisconsin, how they've been collecting antique phones for about 50 years or so. 
They've had phones show up in movies, TV shows. 
And they're facing a challenge in so far as selling these things, getting rid of a lot of them because they really have piled up. 
I am happy to say we have on the phone with us right now Ron Knappen from Funko, Funko Inc. 
Ron, are you with us? 
Yeah. 
Yeah. 
Welcome to Off the Hook. 
Rick, tell us, how many phones would you estimate you have? 
Probably about 50,000. 
50,000 phones. 
I thought I was a collector. 
It's hard to estimate because it's a mixture also along with a lot of parts like handsets, cases, just, you know, partial telephones. 
They're in 33 semi-trailers in our backyard in two, three fairly good-sized farm buildings on our farm and three or four other buildings, one which is a four-story, 300-foot building. 
And it's overwhelming that it's there. 
How many semis did you say? 
33 old semi-trailers that are pretty full. 
I mean, you can walk down through the middle, but we built shelving through the years so that all this stuff occupies. 
But there's, like, one semi-trailer has about 1,200 oak crank wall telephones with a cradle on the top. 
They're missing the handsets. 
Well, we've got the handsets, but it's kind of a Pepper McGee's closet of all sorts of things related to telephonies, to telephony. 
There's one trailer that has probably around 800 to 1,000 walnut bell boxes that were, the nomenclature would be Ericsson. 
They were used with the Ericsson candlestick phone out of mostly the British island, but they were spread out all over Europe, Eastern Europe, going mostly as far as Antwerp and thereabouts. 
And, of course, Scandinavia, because they're basically an Ericsson contrivance. 
I've got ones sitting on the kitchen table in front of me. 
Wow. 
Just the fact that you have 33 semi-trailers, that would be something that was impressive in and of itself. 
But the fact that they're filled with telephones and telephone equipment, that is just, you know, it's overwhelming. 
It really is absolutely incredible. 
How did this get started? 
When did you begin collecting telephones? 
Well, in 1942 or so, first of all, I am basically an adventuresome person into the past and have been fascinated by a lot of antiquity, mostly practical stuff that is more not refined. 
And so, but I was a dump picker in 1942 and going into the second grade. 
I don't remember too many phones then. 
I remember one phone in an empty building. 
And then, in 1942 or 43, my neighbor introduced me to, it was a shed full of old wooden wall crank phones, the large ones. 
And I'm pretty sure they were probably Swedish-American because his dad was strictly Swedish by the name of Magnussen. 
And he ran Peoria Electric, and Peoria Electric in Peoria, Illinois, they even had their own nameplate that they put on these old wooden wall phones. 
I don't know for sure how. 
I've seen one or a picture of one, but I don't think I have one. 
I would kind of like to have one just around as a keepsake, just like a poster I have of the county fairs here. 
I sold a few, but I'm keeping one, and somebody wanted to buy it, and I said, you wait until I die. 
I want to enjoy just walking past it now and then and having it in my midst, M-I-D-S-T. 
Just have it around as an atmospheric thing because it reminds me of my adventures into the past and discovering things and like an explorer. 
But Don Magnussen, he showed me these phones in the shed, and I don't know how, can't remember how many, there probably were 20 or 30 of them. 
And they were the big ones. 
And then when his dad got whiff of the wind about this, he confronted me and he said, you can have them for, I don't remember if it was $2 a piece or $3. 
But who was I going into the second grade in grade school to have the money and a place to put them? 
My dad used his garage. 
I eventually kind of filled it up with stuff. 
But I didn't have the wherewiths and how to engage in such a thing. 
And then through the high school years, in 1950, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, I graduated. 
I would enjoy looking through the classified ads in Popular Mechanics. 
And there was one thing that I always remember, and that was an advertisement for old telephones from Bob Prosser. 
I forget what he called his business, A&M Telephone Company or something, or just Telephone Company, Turtle Lake, Wisconsin, who ended up having a million telephones. 
He was featured in the Wall Street Journal some years ago. 
They called me and were going to interview me, and I introduced them to Bob's estate, and that did it. 
They went into the history of Bob Prosser, who allegedly had a million phones, was in Ripley's, believe it or not, Guinea's Book of Records. 
But in the 1950s, he advertised in Popular Mechanics, and I don't know what other else magazines, like candlestick phones for $5 a piece and things like that. 
And I would never have forgot that. 
And when I was in my career of actually teaching industrial arts in small high schools for 12 years, I bought one. 
And I bought it in around 1962 or 60, somewhere in there, and to put it in my dad's basement, it was what they call the 300 set. 
That would be about a 1940, anywhere between 1940 and 1953 Western Electric, before the 500 set, or the ordinary rotary dial plastic phone that Western Electric and IT&T... 
Right, these are the real heavy ones, the ones you could really hurt somebody with, very heavy phones. 
The 1940 phones are very heavy in weight. 
Yeah, they were. 
They first started out steel, or zinc, and then they went to Bakelite, and then a mixture of Bakelite and plastic, and then turned out to be fully plastic by the 1950s. 
But I put one in dad's basement, and then the telephone company, they knew it, and it was a bell. 
And they confronted my dad through a mail and said, you have an illegal phone, and you'll be penalized at a dollar a month for having that illegal phone in your basement. 
Wow. 
So that went on. 
And then I never forgot about Bob Frosser and Turtle Lake, and then I was called an antique picker in the early 1960s. 
And I had a guy pop up in my house that we rented for $25 a month, and he was a telephone collector by the name of my Bud Johnson from Galesburg, Illinois. 
And Bob, he looked all through my antiques and looked for telephone items and bought them, and he told me a few stories, which most all the stories you hear from a lot of these old people are somewhat interesting, because it's an adventure that they experienced and are relating to. 
And I always enjoy sharing these with people, not with charitably. 
And so, but Bud told me he refinished old telephones and sold them for, I think it was $20 or $25 apiece. 
And during the same time, I learned of them taking the old wooden crank phones, they were oak, as a rule. 
There were maybe about one walnut out of every hundred or eighty wood oak ones. 
Walnut was an earlier wood used in the telephones. 
It was plentiful until after the turn of the century, and walnut became scarcer. 
And so they started making stuff out of oak, including the telephones. 
But most of the telephones before 1900 were walnut. 
The candlestick phones, of course, that's another story. 
But Bud offered to sell me his refinished oak crank phones for, I don't know, $25 apiece. 
And I'd buy them, and they were beautiful, and I'd sell them for $29 or $30. 
And then I ran into a, well, he decided to sell his collection. 
And we were at his location near Galesville, Illinois, Galesburg, during Christmas of 1971. 
And I called them up, and I said, Bud, I'd like to buy some more of those nice phones you refinished. 
And he said, I'm going to sell my collection. 
And I went over, and I spent, I think it was probably $250 is all I had on those old phones. 
And they were, they weren't extremely rare, but they kind of got on the borderline of being a little rare, more rare than the common old kitchen phones that were common around the Midwest in the 1930s and 40s. 
And I brought them home in a 56 Buick with the kids. 
I had three kids, and they rode on top of these phones in the back seat and the back floor all the way home, the 250 miles or 280 miles, whatever it was, and with them ringing when we'd hit a bump. 
And got home, and I was nervous, because I spent all our money, and we had house payments. 
And I was on a low teacher's salary, starting out at $4,100 a year in 1961. 
I don't know what it was in 1971. 
It was probably more like $5,000. 
And so I was, and I had house payments, so on a $4,200 old house in Melrose, Wisconsin. 
And I was nervous about it, and I put an ad in the Antique Trader. 
I think it was a monthly magazine at that time. 
And the ad came out on January 6th of 1972, and it was just dumbfounding. 
I was on the phone for about an hour every night for the whole week, taking calls from mostly collectors. 
One collector, I can't think of his name right at the moment, but we became friends with many collectors. 
And this one collector said, I have kind of a weird hobby. 
And he acted like he was almost ashamed of it, that he collected telephones. 
But these people, I've got a picture here of Walt Adelot from New Jersey, and Steve Hiltz from Saloma, Arizona, who have been friends like this since 1971, or 72, no, 72, yeah. 
And then this Bob Prosser in Turtle Lake, he, and I knew where there were phones. 
There was a guy in Wittenberg, Wisconsin, that's eastern Wisconsin, not quite to Appleton, and southwest of Green Bay a little ways. 
And this guy ran a telephone company there. 
He was 80 years old. 
And I went there, and I bought a lot of old telephone stuff from him. 
And some of them, you know the little plastic mouthpiece that screws in to the front of a candlestick phone? 
Yes. 
It's funnel-shaped? 
Mm-hmm. 
Well, he had those in porcelain, and in the plastic or Bakelite ones he had, I don't think they were plastic. 
They were Bakelite from the 20s and 30s. 
And he had green ones and red ones. 
They were dark colored, mixed with... 
Ron, can I just break in for a second? 
What kind of phone are you using right now? 
I'm using... 
Well, let's see. 
I'll put my glasses on so I can read it here. 
It's called... 
It's a Panasonic Ease-a-phone. 
It's convenient. 
I just pressed speakerphone to dial out and touched the pad, and it had to redial, but it went bad. 
Uh-huh. 
It sounds pretty good. 
There's a slight hum, but I think that's on the phone line, and that's something that you get. 
Yeah, that's on the line. 
Yeah. 
Kyle, you had a question. 
Go ahead. 
Oh, I had a couple. 
This was such a great conversation, but it's such a heavy material, that oak and walnut, and imagining you as a second grader. 
I mean, it's starting this adventure that you're on, but just the logistics of finding a thing like a whole shed full of them. 
After that, was it mostly a string of happenstances through relationships, or did you find, like, more businesses, more offices, and maybe small telephone providers that were looking for a place for all this, or is it mostly those strings of happenstance? 
There were strings of happenstances, starting with Bud Johnson, and then going to when I discovered Bob Prosser, 150 miles north of me here, Turtle Lake, who claimed he had a million phones, and was in Ripley's, believe it or not, in Guinea Book of Records. 
That's all gone. 
A lot of stuff is gone, and my stuff will be gone, too, in not too long of a time, I believe. 
Well, that's part of why we're talking to you, because the reason why this is a news story is because you're trying to get rid of a lot of these phones. 
You're trying to sell the majority of your collection. 
Has that really been a challenge? 
In a way, it just sits here. 
It's not hurting anything. 
The only, you know, but there's several buildings full. 
There is one building that's 300 feet long and four stories high. 
Oh, my God. 
And we're having a hard time getting out of there. 
I've sold the building on a land contract, and I'll get the full payment, which is, you know, not modestly. 
It's a modest amount of money once we vacate the building. 
My wife, Mary, bless her heart, she spends every night until around 11 o'clock sorting parts out, which she brings home in the trunk of her car. 
But happenchance, yes. 
These phones turned up in strange ways and unexpected. 
There was a junkyard in Oregon, Illinois, which is not far from Dixon, where Reagan grew up, Illinois, and 80 miles, might be about 60 miles west of Chicago, Oregon, junkyard. 
And he had boxcars, and Bud went there one time to investigate and explore his boxcars, and the junkyard owner sent him out there. 
And when Bud got out to the boxcars, he was greeted by junkyard dogs, real dogs that were fairly aggressive and scared the heck out of them. 
He never went back there again. 
I guess the trailers were full of mostly ringer boxes, the little boxes you crank that are attached to a candlestick or a non-dial payphone, because, or not payphone, well, yes, those two, but to a phone that didn't have a dial, before dial, of course. 
And so you'd crank that box. 
I used one in the 1950s when I was going to college on the GI Bill, and I called a girl on it, and it was a small payphone, and it had the ringer box connected to it. 
So you'd ring that, and you'd get the operator, and she'd say, what number, please? 
And so I guess I had the number in my pocket. 
I don't remember. 
It was around 1957, and I was going to college on the GI Bill up there in Wisconsin. 
Ron, I just had a question then. 
For the sake of conversation, since you are asking for help with the phones, and if you were able to do some kind of fire sale or something, would you have enough help to keep up, because they're heavy items, and it sounds like a lot of them, even in the best scenario, what would you say the ideal solution for you would be, and would you have enough extra hands to package stuff or to help direct it, assuming everything found a home? 
Yep. 
The thing is, is that if, I just discussed, we had a call today, it was only about two and a half hours ago, two hours, from a fellow in a large city who had the ways and means to buy us completely out in one swipe. 
Whoa. 
S-W-I-P-E. 
And it would take about, oh, close to $200,000, and he could come and take what he wanted. 
And, yes, we have several people here that are employed that would help carry these things or put them on an elevator, excavator, or whatever you call it, a conveyor, yeah, that's what it is, that we put them up into the barn attic with. 
And he would probably take all those phones because we spent, we had people working for us all through the 70s and 80s and 90s who were very proficient in restoring these plastic and Bakelite phones from the 1920s, 30s, 40s, and they're beautiful. 
And they're wrapped up in plastic, and they've put a lot of time, and nowadays, forget it. 
They're spending, what, $30 an hour for employees to do this type of stuff. 
They're there. 
And whoever bought this stuff, I don't care if it was $200,000 or what it would be, they'd just take what they wanted and leave the rest. 
They probably wouldn't take much out of the trailers. 
What I fear is that they wouldn't take the walnut ringer boxes. 
They're beautiful when they're refinished, and you can make something else out of them. 
You don't have to keep them as a bell box. 
They've got two bells at the top, and many times since they're Erickson out of, actually, the British Island, probably made in Coventry, England, in the P. 
O'Connor telephone works right before the Second World War. 
The company was, the manufacturing plant was blown up during the war, and then they ended up with a lot of surplus. 
And these walnut ringer boxes apparently survived, and maybe some of them came out of Antwerp. 
I'm not totally sure, but they're beautiful. 
When you refinish those, that's solid, genuine walnut wood, and they are just outstanding. 
Well, I am convinced, Ron. 
I'm convinced that many of our listeners would be very interested in getting their hands on some of those. 
What would be the best way for them to start that process? 
One of the things that I would emphasize would be to get a hold of, not that I'm trying to solicit sales or promote sales. 
I would enjoy the charitable of being able to share what I know about this stuff. 
I like to share stuff like that. 
And I approach it from a chronological, historical telephony correspondence type thing. 
But I've done a number of books on telephone history, and I would encourage people to get a hold of them. 
They're $30 apiece for CD or flash drive. 
And all you have to do is give us a call, and we'll be glad to sell them to you. 
And I'll be glad to announce my phone call to anybody that wants to hear it. 
Okay, well, we'll give out the website and the phone number in just a bit. 
Rob, I think you had a question? 
Go ahead. 
Yeah, Ron, thank you so much for joining us tonight. 
I know all of us on this program are so interested in the vintage telephone stuff that you're so into. 
I can't hardly hear you. 
Okay, I'll try to turn him up a little bit. 
Try it on. 
Okay, Ron, it's so great to hear from you tonight. 
And I know so much of us are fascinated by what you're talking about. 
And we got a wind of your story from a great write-up you had recently in the Wisconsin State Journal. 
And it mentions another thing that you have done is supply phones to, like, film and television productions and things like that. 
Because, of course, they need old phones if they take place in the past. 
Could you talk a little bit about what that's like? 
Did you just ask me about movies and our phones appearing then? 
It sounded like that, yes. 
Did you have a good question about? 
Yes, that's what he did. 
Okay. 
And our phone call building, we call it, a building that we operated out of starting in 1980, I guess you might say, and we're still occupying or doing business out of that large building in Galesville, small town near La Crosse, Wisconsin. 
Listen, there are pictures along the wall of movies in which our phones appeared in. 
I can conference call Mary, and she has a better recollection naming these movies. 
You've all seen them, and you've seen our phones in there, but you weren't aware that that's where they came from. 
But I can conference call. 
Yeah, but we'd love to hear the conference system at work, but definitely bring Mary in, your wife, who is also part of this business. 
We'd love to hear her perspective. 
Okay, Ron is making a conference call now inside his complex of 50,000 phones out there in Wisconsin. 
It's ringing there now. 
I hear it. 
I hear it. 
And I assume she'll answer. 
She was in the office a while ago, but it's hard to tell. 
Well, just let her know she's on the radio when she picks up. 
That's very important. 
Hello. 
Mary? 
I'm listening to you. 
You are? 
Okay, Mary, tell us, please, what movies, you remember them, and they're right there down there downstairs where you're at in the building. 
Tell us what movies our phones appeared in that we engaged them in. 
Well, the early ones were Eight Men Out and Fried Green Tomatoes. 
But we also did, oh, geez, lots of them. 
J. 
Edgar Hoover, Men in Black, X-Men, Mammoth. 
I know a number of them, JFK, Mad Men, Charlie's Angels. 
How recently? 
What's the one that was most recent, Mary? 
Oh, I can't remember the most recent one. 
Saturday Night Live, we've supplied a few phones for them. 
Oh, that's great. 
Yeah, the advertising companies. 
Do they keep the phones, or do they send them back? 
No, they keep them. 
Okay, wow. 
So, that is incredible. 
Mary, let me ask you, have you had the same interest in phones as Ron? 
Were you? 
I'm very curious how that developed. 
I don't know. 
I guess I've stuck with it, and I've, you know, yeah, it's interesting. 
Wow. 
They want to keep running the business, and that's okay. 
Chicago, we were in Chicago, movie. 
Catch Me If You Can. 
Wow. 
She enjoys. 
Just reading off the list here. 
Field of Dreams. 
Yeah. 
All kinds of movies. 
It's such a critical role, and I hope you know that as lovers of film ourselves, and I'm sure I can speak for many other people, that getting it right and having the real device in a story just sets the scene. 
And especially for people who are fans of telephones, knowing when they might appear, and it really does lend some of that. 
But it's just like any other costume or set dressing. 
It's so important to stories we're telling nowadays. 
Do they know what they want when they ask for a phone, or do you have to guide them to the right kind for the era? 
No, they usually know. 
And they give us a lot of times they'll send us a picture. 
Okay. 
What they have in mind. 
That is so interesting. 
Mm-hmm. 
That is amazing. 
Yeah. 
We've sold a lot of multi-line phones, too. 
Like key systems. 
Business phones. 
Key system or 1A2. 
Yeah. 
Now, Mary, we're going to ask you the same question we asked Ron. 
What kind of phone are you using right now? 
Panasonic. 
You guys like Panasonic. 
Well, they were practical. 
They're one of the last ones that held up okay. 
You know, for a while, the phones coming out of Taiwan were pretty junky. 
And you couldn't fix them hardly either. 
But in the last 30 years or more, they've been pretty substantial. 
And they'll last a long time. 
Our son had a dealership, and we're selling them. 
So we got one. 
And our business had this phone. 
We can do extensions and multi-lines and so on. 
That's great. 
That's amazing. 
So now let me just ask you guys, is there a favorite era of telephones that you can point to and say, this is when phones were at their peak. 
This is when they were really, really good. 
You mean from historical, antique, and selling adventure, or just in a general sphere? 
Generally, just as a phone that you would use. 
You know, voice quality and durability. 
What do you think has lasted the best? 
Well, the 500 set, that was really the, that had a 20-year lifespan when it was new. 
Back in the 80s, early 80s, 70s, 20-year lifespan. 
They just never would give out. 
I mean, everything that ages suffers from certain things about the age, including the human body. 
But the telephones, they'll absorb corrosion of different types. 
They call it, what do you call it when you get a contact points that become corroded? 
I guess corrosion. 
And it doesn't have to be because it's in an atmosphere that's subject to corrosion. 
It can just be old age. 
I mean, nothing much you can do about it. 
It just happens. 
It's like the body. 
And so, but the 500 set was, and you get into the 2500 set, there you get into a challenge with the touch-tone dial. 
And there are weaknesses that are inherent in a touch-tone dial that aren't in a rotary dial. 
Well, they started making those in 1921 or 22, and, well, earlier, but really got off the start big in 22. 
And Ericsson, all their parts and the dial were made on a, by machine. 
They weren't stamped out like automatic electrics were. 
But the touch-tone dial, but the touch-tone dial offered some challenge in working, but they were pretty good. 
Western Electric wasn't the only name. 
Northern Electric, which is a twin to Western, out of Canada. 
And then, of course, IT&T and Stromberg-Carlson, those people almost, I think they copied Western Electric. 
And so they were identical, and parts would interchange. 
But the touch-tone dial, that touch-tone dial, American-made, was really great. 
Now, I'm not running the foreign ones down right now, the Panasonic. 
I don't know if I've ever had a Panasonic touch-tone dial go bad on us. 
And we've used them for, wouldn't you say, 20 years, Mary? 
Yeah. 
That's great. 
That's great to have something last that long. 
And I have to say, you know, we use 500 sets around here, too, because they just sound so good. 
They're solid, and it doesn't make a difference if somebody calls you on the phone, and you're speaking to them on a rotary dial phone, as long as it sounds good. 
Yeah. 
Yeah. 
The nice thing about the older phones, too, is you can replace the parts, like a transmitter and receiver, if they go bad. 
Yeah, you just unscrew a cap on the handset and pop it out and pop another one in. 
It's a great way to teach people how phones work. 
Take it apart, put it back together, see how it all operates, because the theory is pretty much the same. 
It's just, with today's modern equipment, you can't do anything with it, so you don't learn how it actually works. 
Yeah, and the people that were fixing the electronic phones, they've disappeared, haven't they, Mary? 
Yeah. 
We used to send people to them, because we were, it was beyond us to fix most all the electronic phones that were made in the last 20 years or so. 
So we'd send them to certain specialists, but I don't think they're around anymore. 
A lot of this stuff is gone, G-O-N-E. 
Yeah, I think that's something that a lot of us are experiencing, and unless you have the tooling and microscopes and stuff, it can be incredibly difficult. 
And many of the repair shops can't create much of a business model around it, because the costs for a lot of the products are so low that the amount of labor hours to do component-level soldering for different types of chips and fuses and pieces on the board... 
Yeah, unfortunately, the labor cost now is extremely difficult. 
Sure, sure. 
...and there's not a good way to streamline the procedures on these things to make them cost-effective at all. 
It's not like McDonald's. 
No, no, it's not. 
Ron, let me ask you, have you ever been to a telephone museum, and have they taken notice of what you guys are doing? 
We've got one. 
Well, yes, you live in one, that's true. 
But there's one in Seattle, there's one out here in Long Island, they're all over the place, run by telephone pioneers, usually. 
Well, we created one in our building, and it's still there, and there's pictures of it in that article that the people from the Wisconsin State Journal did, just like an aisle where I'm standing at the end of it. 
And there's a, you know, how many phones do you think's in there, Mary? 
About 80 or 100? 
Oh, probably more than that, probably. 
150 to 100? 
But, uh... 
Including the Erickson Eiffel Tower, which was 1892, and with the iron-curving legs and the pinstriping and all that stuff. 
If that's in there, I think there's three or four examples, all the stuff's for sale, because we want to move out of the building. 
We sold the building on a land contract, and when we vacated, we get the full amount for the building, and then we can live happily ever after in Mayberry or Dreamland. 
Well, Bell used to have a big telephone museum in Chicago, Ron. 
Yeah, but, uh, top story of the Bell telephone building, I put, I drove in there, you go down through a door in the basement, and there's a turnstile, and it'll turn you around, park your truck or whatever. 
I had an old, big old Suburban, and, uh, then you take the elevator up to the top floor, and there was a regular museum up there. 
And Bell employees would donate, you know, when they retired or died, uh, the people left over would give their phones to the museum. 
I went there and bought duplicates from the curator. 
Yeah, that was a nice museum, but it went, for some reason, they discontinued it, but all the surplus and all the phones went to the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, which is sizable itself, and I haven't been back there to see that. 
Wow. 
You know, uh, one thing that, uh, you said, uh, about the old phone from the 1800s, uh, leads me to ask, um, what is the oldest phone that you have, and the oldest operating phone? 
Well, Mary, you helped me a little bit, but I think there's probably an 18, there's, of course, duplicate, reproductions of Bell's invention, the, what do you call some of those, Mary? 
Help me. 
Well, the camera phone, the gallows phone, the... 
Yeah, those are repros. 
Yeah. 
But there's a few that go back into the 1880s, I think, and I, I don't, I don't know if I can associate them or not, can you, but then... 
Well, the two-box phones, you know, the... 
The three-box phones, really. 
But they could only go back to the 1880s, or even 1890s, Mary. 
I don't know as we have any that really go back into the early 1980s, or 1880s, or the late 1870s. 
Wow. 
We have some fragments, or parts, partial ones, maybe, but I, I don't, they probably go back to 1878 or something, those partial ones, but nothing that, there's, you know, how many collectors, Mary, 400, that belong to the two main telephone collectors club? 
Yeah, one time there was close to 4,000. 
Were there? 
Yeah, I don't know how many there are today. 
Oh, it's dwindled. 
Yeah. 
The interest is, is diminished, and then most of us are... 
Well, a lot of them have died off, too. 
Yeah, and most of us left are, you know, in our, in our 70s or 80s, and, and, and we're, we're, we keep dying. 
And, and, and, and, and, and, and, and some of them specialize in some pretty weird stuff. 
Uh, John Dresser's one of the names, um, he's from out west somewhere, and he's very active, and Tom Adams, he lives right out there on the eastern part of the country. 
He's fairly famous with the collectors, and very, very, uh, sharing, uh, uh, charitably with his goings-on with restoring these old telephones. 
Very interesting. 
Have you found that there's, uh, uh, much interest in younger people in, uh, collecting old phones? 
No. 
Really? 
No, there was a, a, a kid, high school kid, how old was he, Mary, 15, and he killed himself? 
Mm-hmm. 
He, he, he, he had, he had some special, uh, things about him that were, um, were mishaps about his, his nature, and, um, he was bothered by kids in school or something, and so he, but he, I sat with him at a telephone collector's club, uh, get together, uh, three or four years ago. 
We won the Smitty Award, which is an award for, uh, sharing our interests with people, whoever would inquire, and so we were awarded with that as a plaque that we'll have hanging from the wall in our office when we get out here to the barn again, and it's, um, he sat next to us when we were at that telephone collector's show. 
There's usually one main big telephone collector's show every year, and then there's another one, um, that is competitive with it, um, so there's two collector clubs, and, uh, one's ATCA, and the other's TCI, and they're almost competitive. 
Um, the TCI is, well, it reminds me of the Amis over in, in Pakistan. 
They're competitive, um, for some reason. 
I don't know why, and so there's rivalry. 
Well, some of the, uh, collectors, um, sons and grandkids are also interested in phones, so there's a few there. 
Yeah, there's a few. 
In our community, we come across a lot of people who are interested in old technology of various sorts, vintage computers, or old telephones, so they're definitely out there, and hopefully we can help you connect with them. 
But right now, I want to give out your information, because we're coming up to the last, uh, a couple of minutes of the show, which is incredible. 
We could talk for hours about this. 
Uh, the website is www.phonecoinc.com. 
That's spelled P-H-O-N-E-C-O-I-N-C dot C-O-M. 
I don't think there's a dot after www, is there, Mary? 
Yeah, there is a dot. 
Yeah, www.phonecoinc.com. 
And, um, uh, it's okay to give out the, uh, the phone number that's on the website. 
Of course. 
It's 608. 
Go ahead. 
582. 
Well, 4124 is the business number. 
Okay. 
2263 is at home, but that'd be after 9 in the morning. 
I don't get up till after 9. 
Mm-hmm. 
So, I'm 80, going on 88 years old. 
That is incredible, and, uh, you, you, you sound as young as ever, and, uh, I think, I think... 
Well, they say I look that way, but I don't feel that way. 
I think the phones, the phones have a magic property to them, so, uh, I think that's something that, uh, you're, you're, you're gifted with. 
Uh, we only have, uh, uh, one minute left, so is there any, uh, closing remark that either you or Mary would like to give to our audience? 
I would welcome any calls with questions or interest in antique telephones or the subject of that of any type. 
I, I did up, uh, uh, some, uh, promotion material on the Erickson Eiffel Tower, I mean, uh, help me, Mary, the Ericaphone, which was a 1955 Erickson. 
And, uh, I'm running out of time, I'll, I'll bug off. 
Just today, I did that promotion material to go into a telephone collector's newsletter, and it's, it's historical. 
I don't, I, I, I mix it. 
Um, they're available, and I'm not trying to make a money on this stuff so much as I am just offering to get rid of it. 
And, and, and share it. 
And we supply parts, like, uh, mouthpieces that are broken or missing, and cranks, and cords, and receivers, and stuff like that, so. 
It's in a catalog, and our catalog, and we'd be glad to send it out to anybody that inquires about it. 
Yeah, I'm gonna go through and see if I, uh, have a parts list of, uh, some extra things I want to have around for, for some of our phones, so I'm sure other people will do the same. 
Definitely. 
Ron and Mary Knappen of, uh, Galesville, Wisconsin. 
It's been a pleasure talking to you this last hour, and I'm sure we'll have more conversations in the future about telephones, and, and collecting, and all sorts of things like that. 
We wish you the best of luck. 
You're welcome, man. 
We'll, we'll be, uh, we'll be in touch. 
We'll be, uh, definitely. 
Thank you. 
Thank you for giving, having the privilege and the pleasure of sharing with you. 
And I wish you well. 
Thanks. 
Happy Thanksgiving. 
Goodbye. 
Happy Thanksgiving to you, too. 
So long. 
Take care. 
Wow. 
That was, uh, that was pretty awesome. 
And, uh, we are out of time. 
OTH at 2600.com is our email address. 
Please write to us, uh, with any questions or comments. 
And, uh, stay tuned. 
Coming up in a couple of minutes on YouTube, we'll be on Overtime. 
Check the link at 2600.com, or simply go to Channel 2600 on YouTube. 
See you next week.