A couple of weeks ago, I asked if anyone knew what happened to the second story of the old Ridgeway telephone central office, located on the corner of Main and Pine streets. No one that I asked ever remembered the building having two stories. This weekend, I got a wonderful phone call from Beverly S and she gave me the final clue I needed to find the answer: as far back as 1940, when she and her siblings were attending the Ridgeway school, that building had only been one story.
Given that bit of information from Beverly, I searched the Ridgeway Journals and found an article published December 3, 1936, that the telephone exchange was getting a new switchboard and the building was to be remodeled in 1937 to be reduced to just one story. The building needed considerable alteration and they decided that a second story was no longer needed. The switchboard was located on the second story and patrons found it “rather inconvenient” to go upstairs to use the phone. The remodel would move the switchboard to the front room facing Main Street and the remaining three rooms would be the living quarters for Mrs. Katy Taff, the chief operator at the time. So, my little mystery is solved and thank you, Beverly, for giving me that clue so that I could search papers in the correct time frame and for the enjoyable phone conversation!
