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Want to support this channel and help us preserve old films? Visit Visit our website Produced by Ronald Spencer and Pacesetter Productions, this British Telecom promo film explains the evolution of telecommunications in Great Britain, starting from operators manually connecting calls, Almon Brown Strowger’s Strowger switch invention, the Crossbar switch, taken over by the reed relay switch, and lastly the System X digital switching system. The film is a Pacesetter Production by British Telecom, written, produced, and directed by Ronald Spencer. The film is narrated by Michael Dean, composed by Pat Cory, photographed by Alec Sheridan, edited by Peter Pitt, with sound by Dudley Plummer, and animations by Hedley Griffin. A mother walks her child in a stroller (00:08). She parks the stroller by a phone booth (00:15). Alerting scenes of people using phones (00:22). Various people of all ages in the streets of London are asked about the functionalities of phones (01:10). “The Telephone Exchange” title banner (01:56). Mondial House, a main telecommunications hub in Central London, built in 1972 and demolished in 2006 (02:01). Views of telephone wires built on rooftops and overground in the late 1800s or early 1900s (02:33). A telephone operator manually connecting calls (02:55). Footage of Kansas City, Missouri, during the American Western period in the late 1800s (03:32). Almon Brown Strowger, inventor of the Strowger switch: an electromechanical telephone exchange system (03:43). Scenes of the Old West in Kansas City (03:46). Almon Strowger (04:18). Graphics explaining the functions of the Strowger switch (04:30). A telecommunication building (05:57). Views of the functions of the Strowger switch in use (06:09). Almon Strowger (06:44). Views of engineers in the 1930’s working on the development of the Crossbar switch electrotechnical device (06:51). Views of the Crossbar switch in use (07:04). Graphics explaining the electromagnetic functions of the Crossbar (07:32). Many connected wires (08:03). A telephone operator manually connecting calls (08:18). Views of the functions of the manual switchboards (08:33). Graphics explaining the functions of the manual switchboards (08:57). Rows of switch-systems (09:30). A girl roller-skating and listening to music through her Sony Walkman (09:50). Various electronics, including a calculator and an alarm clock (10:08). Two children play with electronic toys (11:13). Electric chess (11:29). A soccer video game (11:42). A boy is walking (11:47). He checks his Casio digital watch (11:53), and then runs (11:57). A black-and-white photograph of telephone engineers (12:18). A reed relay switch invented in 1936 (12:32). Graphics explaining the functions of the reed relay (12:48). Views of electronic switching systems (ESS) (13:17). Automatic typewriters (13:36). Scenes of people using phones (13:50). A manual switchboard (14:00). The Strowger switch (14:04). The Crossbar switch (14:07). The reed relay (14:09). Graphics explaining the functions of connecting numbers through the exchange systems (14:20). A ticking clock (15:08). An elderly lady sewing (15:15). A circuit attached to a needed eye (15:19). An engineer looking at a silicon chip through a microscope: the System X digital switching system which replaced the reed relay (15:34). A System X telephone exchange system building (16:47). Altering footage of microchip switchers and telephones (17:26). A man waiting at a bus stop received an alert from his pager (18:01). He walks to a nearby phonebooth (18:15). A printer and a fax-machine (18:20). Men watching television using Contravision closed circuit TV (18:34). Mondial House (19:32). A telephone operator manually connecting calls (19:51). Operators working to solve problems with the electronic switching systems and providing personal service (20:01). Views of the functions and wires of electronic switching systems (20:58). A child speaking about the functions of telecommunication (21:18). Informational text overlay (21:28). Credits (21:43). Mondial House was a main telecommunications hub in central London on the banks of the River Thames. It was known as an international switching centre (ISC). Built in 1978 the building was seen as controversially modern-looking. It was demolished in 2006. This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit
