Mystery Photo

Winfield Historical Society and Museum provides photos of Winfield’s past each week for Beacon readers. Do you know the when, where, who or what seen in this week’s photograph?

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Last week’s answer:

Who are these Winfield ladies?

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Pictured are Winfield phone operators Ina Owens, Marie McCaw and Hazel McCaw.

Despite most walking around with a phone in their pocket now-a-days, many recall a time when the phone was still connected to a cord in their home.

Fewer recall a time when that phone required talking to phone operators like Owens and the McCaws. Of those that remember the time of phone operators, many have happy memories of that time and can still recite their phone numbers. Of course, phone numbers then were a bit simpler to remember.

Commenting on this image shared from the Winfield Historical Society and Museum, Neil Hillyard, shared his home phone number of only three digits, 321, and Hillyard Implement Company’s of only two, 64.

In the 1950s, Hillyard shared, he would crank a wall phone in his home to reach an operator he knew as Sadie.

“She was such a nice lady,” Hillyard said. “I remember, as a child, going into the telephone office on the corner of main street and visiting with her and seeing her big board she [used to connect] callers.”

Monty Linder shared that his mother Mildred Linder was an operator when he was a child growing up in Winfield.

“I couldn’t call Wyman after school because mom said I needed to be doing schoolwork and wouldn’t connect me,” he recalled.

Mildred worked for many years as an operator for the Winfield Telephone Company and even held the title of Chief Telephone Operator for two years.

Comments: AnnaMarie.Kruse@southeastiowaunion.com