Suppose you've got a number you want to call. What's the first thing you do? Take up your receiver and listen for the dial tone. Here's how it sounds.

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Miss White - Listen for the Dial Tone

So called "Modern" dial tone is a combination of two pure frequencies. 350Hz and 440Hz blend together to make a pleasant harmony.

350 plus 440 Equals Dial Tone

GEdney-9 Dial Tone with Timeout (vintage electromechanical telephone sound)

GE9vsModernDialtone

120-600Tone

Chuck Richards Dial Tone and Double Ringback

GE9vsCRichardsDialtone

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Prax LD Operators - Electromechanical Network and Intercept Operator Remix

More Jane Barbe...

Jane Barbe - That's Fascinating

Before there was Jane Barbe, there was Mary Moore. Like Jane, Mary made time machine and other recorded announcements for the Audichron Company of Atlanta, Georgia.

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Mary Moore - Find It Fast

An unnamed woman with one of the most beautiful telephone voices ever, will discourage your callers from leaving voice mail messages, in favor of simply calling again later.

(Sampled from Evan Doorbell's Phabulous collection of telephone sounds.)

Owen Murphy Lady: Try Calling Later (use for voice mail greeting)

Sampled from Evan Doorbell's phabulous collection of historic telephone sounds — PhoneTrips.com

Phone

JNoise-2 — Electromechanical Analog Telephone Sounds - 1970's

ElmerCat.org

Directory Assistance

Directory Assistance 2

Directory Ma'elp you?

The sound of a 1980's era ESS telephone exchange connecting to complete an outgoing call. It's a short, crisp, analog sound of the ESS's glass-tube relays making a connection to a long distance circuit, which adds it's own bit of "chirping" resonance.  

Use this track as an alert tone, and your incoming emails and texts will arrive with the distinctive class and elegance of a Western Electric #1 ESS central office exchange!

To use as an iPhone alert, simply download and rename the file from .m4a to .m4r, then install with iTunes.

(sampled from Evan Doorbell's track: "Early 80's pgm. 13" https://soundcloud.com/evan-doorbell/early80s13 )

PhoneNoises

ESS Connecting Sound — Download and use as: Short, Crisp, Elegant, Analog, iPhone Alert Tone

This track has been moved to YouTube. Listen to it here:
https://youtu.be/FICCiOQrrUM

A random shuffling of electromechanical telephone sound samplings, featuring real intercept operators and vintage telephone voice artists, including the most famous and incomparable, Jane Barbe.

Sampled from Evan Doorbell's vast and precious library of historic telephone sounds: https://soundcloud.com/evan-doorbell

Operators

Operator Roulette 3 — (3 hours) Free Direct Download — "Take another spin"

Download the m4r version of this ringtone at ElmerCat.org/phone/ringtones/

This is a simple "City Ring" ringback tone from the famous GEdney-9 Panel exchange, located in New York Telephone's 77th Street central office building. More information at ElmerCat.org/category/gedney/

Elmer's Vintage Telephone Sound Ringtones
Mashup's made with samples from Evan Doorbell's historic collection at PhoneTrips.com

GEdney-9 Panel City Ring (1930's-70's New York City electromechanical exchange ringing sound)

Operator Roulette ( featuring Electromechanical Telephone Sounds and REAL Operators! )

Kitty Carlisle

Kitty Carlisle in Montreal, Quebec - Singing 659-4 "No Such Number"

Kitty Carlisle in New Haven, Connecticut - Singing "No Such Number"

Kitty Carlisle - "No Such Number" Tone Generator (vacuum tube analog circuitry)

Bayside, Queens, New York NYCQNYBA - Funky Ringback Tone 423-9982 (electromechanical analog sound)

Brooklyn, New York "Avenue I" NYCKNYAI - Ring to Machine Intercept (electromechanical analog sound)

Brooklyn, New York "71st Street" NYCKNY71 - Ringback Tone (vintage electromechanical analog sound)

Atlanta, Georgia - Step Reorder Tone "City Ring" Tone Plant (electromechanical analog sounds)

Atlanta, Georgia - Step Reorder Tone "Crossbar 5" Tone Plant (electromechanical analog sounds)

In this particular neighborhood, there's a very loud background noise on the line. Evan takes a long time to dial his call, and then the noise gets quieter.

Bronx, New York NYCXNYGC (Grand Concourse) - Payphone to Centrex Busy (extraordinary noise)

Braselton, Georgia BATNGAXA - Ring to Machine Intercept (featuring Jane Barbe)

Amarillo, Texas AMRLTX02 - Dialtone and Ring to Intercept Operator

In addition to the fabulous noises made by the Panel exchange supervision test, the analog amplifiers in the wire trunk connection add a rich and beautiful background noise.

Brooklyn to Manhattan "Panel" Supervision Test - (wonderful "Wire Trunk Repeater" background noise)

Bronx to Manhattan, New York NYCMNYTH (Thayer St.) - Payphone #1 Crossbar Crosstalk to Ringback Tone

Jefferson, Georgia JFSNGAXA - Machine Intercept (featuring Jane Barbe)

Mont Laurier, Quebec MTLRPQXT - Ring to Answer

Crossbar 5 - Marker Sound

Multi-Frequency MF Tone Pulsing - "KP-7034299999-ST"

Auxvasse, Missouri AXVSMOXA - Ring and Intercept Tone

York, Pennsylvania YORKPAXM - Ringback Tone and Machine Intercept Recording

Didja

Elmer has always loved playing with the telephone!

Many of these sounds were originally made by analog, electromechanical equipment that no longer exists today.

Please visit http://ElmerCat.org for stories and more information.

Many of the tracks were made by sampling Evan Doorbell's precious library of vintage telephone sounds at PhoneTrips.com. Evan made extensive, analog recordings of the electromechanical sounds made by the telephone switching network in the 1970's. I recommend visiting PhoneTrips.com and listen to Evan's fascinating presentations in their entirety to learn more about what these now extinct sounds were all about.

Now, keep these vintage sounds alive!

Some tracks are intended as Mash-Up cell phone ringtones and alert-tones. You may download them directly from this site to use on your own devices.

Banish embarrassing ringtones like "Marimba" from your life, once and for all!

( If you require a tone in "iOS M4R" format, please go to ElmerCat.org/ringtones. )

ElmerCat

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