Women chasing the crimson gentle – The Phone Operator’s Story [청계천 옆 사진관]

by times news cr

2024-06-16 12:39:04

Byun Younger-wook’s 100-year photograph no. 65

● Operators ready to attach calls

The photograph chosen by Baeknyeon Picture this week is a photograph that appeared on web page 2 of the Dong-A Ilbo dated June 13, 1924.

Donga Ilbo, June 13, 1924

Women sit in entrance of phone exchanges lined up towards the partitions of a slender workplace. Behind them, supervisors stand in spades. When the crimson gentle comes on, it means the cellphone desires to attach. The ladies’ position is to rapidly join you to the specified quantity. Let’s check out the article.

In case you take off the cellphone and put your ear to it, everybody will say “hello hello”. So does the “hello hello” sound come from a machine? no. It comes from the mouths of flower-like ladies who’re the proudest of all individuals and whose youthful blood boils. In case you go to the Gwanghwamun phone department, which has the deepest reference to Korean phone subscribers, you will note a mysterious girl wearing snow-white crimson and a purple skirt, with the receiver tilted to her head, chasing the twinkling crimson gentle and answering the quantity known as as rapidly as lightning. Plug it in and join the cellphone. Even if you happen to put answerable for quite a few numbers in entrance of 1 particular person and join them with out even batting a watch, they name after you. Because the world is aware of, when any subscriber makes a name, the sunshine on the cellphone activates, and the operator sees the sunshine, asks a number of occasions, after which places the quantity known as on the opposite aspect to talk. If the calling quantity is speaking, “ He replies, “Hana-shi-ju (on the cellphone).” Furthermore, even inside Seoul, as written within the cellphone quantity guide in line with district, whether it is Yongsan, the quantity is named Yongsan, and if you wish to make a name to the countryside, you first name the quantity outdoors the town after which name the quantity within the countryside.

The decision of the photograph was too low so I attempted in search of one other photograph. I used to be capable of finding a photograph of a similar-looking alternate room. The photograph above is from 50 years in the past.

View of the exchange room at Seoul Overseas Telephone Office (1970s)/Dong-A Ilbo DB

View of the alternate room at Seoul Abroad Phone Workplace (Seventies)/Dong-A Ilbo DB

The career of phone operator started with the introduction of the phone in Korea. It may be stated that the introduction of the phone to Korea started on March 20, 1902, when the Korean Empire Correspondent Company briefly put in a phone line between Hanseong, now Seoul, and Incheon. In these days, you could not make or obtain calls with out going by means of a phone operator. Whenever you decide up the cellphone or flip the deal with, an operator comes out and asks you to inform the quantity you need. Even at present, within the navy, cellphone calls are made by means of switchboard operators. The photograph above is of the area the place the operators are gathered.

In 1971, automated telephones have been launched, permitting callers to straight dial the quantity and communicate to the opposite get together and not using a phone operator. Accordingly, handbook telephones that went by means of a phone operator have been known as ‘heuktong’, and automated telephones that allowed subscribers to make calls straight with out an operator have been known as ‘baektong’. On the time, Baekton was so uncommon that even if you happen to utilized for it, you needed to look ahead to greater than a month or two, and it was stated to be an emblem of wealth on account of its excessive worth. With the completion of the nationwide automated switching community in 1987, the period of 1 phone per family started, making it doable to make calls and not using a phone operator.

● 15-year-old ladies get jobs as phone operators to make a dwelling.

Early phone operators have been largely males, however this started to alter to ladies after the Twenties. An article within the Dong-A Ilbo dated April 12, 1920 introduces phone operator as a brand new occupation for younger ladies. “On the Gyeongseong Publish Workplace, an announcement was made that they have been hiring Korean ladies as phone operators. Commencement from an extraordinary college was adequate for instructional background, and desire was given to those that may communicate Japanese. Throughout her first three-month apprenticeship, she was paid 51 jeon per day, and afterward, she was paid greater than 60 jeon plus a diligence allowance. Her working hours didn’t exceed eight hours a day, with 45 minutes on and quarter-hour off. On the time, there have been three switchboard operators, all of whom have been graduates of Gyeongseong Women’ Excessive Faculty, and so they have been good at their jobs, so it was determined to rent solely ladies to any extent further. “She was 15 or 16 years previous and didn’t work time beyond regulation as a result of her dad and mom forbid her from doing so.”
In keeping with the Donga Ilbo dated July 19, 1931, “There are 3,140 phone subscribers in Seoul and 352 operators. The 2 hours from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. are the busiest, with one operator responding roughly 210 occasions per hour. There are individuals who throw all kinds of insults on the operator as a result of she or he solutions late, so it’s a very tough job.”

Let’s additionally check with the article dated December 11, 1958. “As many as 60 calls have to be exchanged in a single minute, which requires good listening to, a comfortable voice, and fast expertise. “The way in which to amass these expertise is to undergo free procedures for 3 months on the alternate coaching middle put in on the central phone workplace, take the take a look at once more, and obtain a certificates to be eligible to work.”

● In keeping with internationalization, phone operators specializing in overseas languages ​​have emerged… A job that’s now gone

Within the Eighties, in step with the period of globalization, there have been worldwide phone operators. In keeping with an article dated June 21, 1983, “Dial ‘102” or “117,” a median of 17,000 worldwide cellphone calls are made per day (40,000 calls are from abroad) to 157 international locations all over the world. It’s stated that about 100 worldwide phone operators offered the connection in 3 shifts of 8 hours every. Additionally, “After passing the choice take a look at, worldwide phone operators obtain three months of language coaching, comparable to English and Japanese, and proceed to check overseas languages ​​utilizing language labs and VTR textbooks which can be at all times open. As well as, English, Japanese, Chinese language, French, and German” “We submit a two-page report on a second overseas language, comparable to Arabic, each week. Even if you happen to obtain language coaching like this, it takes a couple of yr to have the ability to pay attention calmly to what the opposite particular person is saying with out being embarrassed in any respect,” he explains. It’s stated that out of 400 operators, solely 3 have been males. The article explains that from August 1983, in some areas, together with america, it was doable to make direct calls to overseas international locations with out going by means of an operator. Though the phone operator’s job has progressively turn out to be automated and disappeared as occasions change, phone operators have performed an essential position in connecting individuals. In the present day, we checked out a photograph of a lady phone operator who related phone subscribers in Seoul 100 years in the past. Have you ever ever heard the voice of a phone operator straight? Please share your expertise.

We reside in an period the place anybody can take nice footage of their household and surroundings with a smartphone digital camera. In an age the place pictures has turn out to be commonplace, we search for the unique type of our pictures. A photojournalist selects and introduces a black-and-white photograph that was revealed in a newspaper 100 years in the past each week, and I believe the context of the photograph will turn out to be clearer if readers’ imaginations are added to it.

Reporter Byun Younger-wook [email protected]

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2024-06-16 12:39:04

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