TZUTC: -0700   
   MSGID: 506.points@1:218/700 210c2dec   
   REPLY: 1:3634/12.73 5ca27f03   
   PID: Synchronet 3.17c-Win32  Mar  1 2019 MSC 1800   
   TID: SBBSecho 3.06-Win32 r3.105 Mar  1 2019 MSC 1800   
   -=> mark lewis wrote to Kurt Weiske <=-   
      
    ml> i don't think i've heard about that one but i do know that POTS used a   
    ml> positive ground and you could stick on lead of a buttset into the   
    ml> ground and one on a tip terminal in a pedestal, get dialtone, and make   
    ml> a call... it might be a ring terminal, though... i forget which one was   
    ml> ground...   
      
   If memory serves, ring was ground. Most payphones were ground start   
   lines, to keep people from plugging in a home telephone into a pay   
   phone jack and get dial tone. That made for a good story.   
      
   Red's Java House is a coffee shop/restaurant along the piers in San   
   Francisco - they started selling burgers to longshoremen back in the   
   1930s. When I was doing telecom in the late 80s, there was a story   
   about the pay phone outside of Red's, that kept getting trouble   
   tickets. When the y looked at the phone, it worked fine. More tickets   
   came in. It wasn't until someone noticed that the tech who installed   
   the phone ran a copper wire down the piling into the San Francisco bay   
   that the isolated the problem.   
      
   When the tide came in, the bay water provided the ground. At low tide,   
   the wire was hanging in the air, and no ground.   
      
   They took a more civilized approach to grounding (using a water pipe)   
   and all was well.   
      
      
      
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