TRIVIAL PURSUITS: What Was the Phone Number for the Original Phone in the White House?

As the population and phone use has grown, so have the phone numbers used to call people.

What was the phone number for the original phone in the White House?

 

On May 10, 1877, President Rutherford B. Hayes had the White House’s first telephone installed in the mansion’s telegraph room.

 

The White House phone number was “1.”

 

Phone service throughout the country was in its infancy in 1877. It was not until a year later that the first telephone exchange was set up in Connecticut, and it would be 50 more years until President Herbert Hoover had the first telephone line installed at the president’s desk in the Oval Office.
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