TELEPHONES ARE NO LONGER LUXURY IN TELECOMMUNICATIONS AGE

A century ago, the telephone was a luxury. Today, it's a necessity and part of the ever-growing telecommunications industry.

Everything from voices, to faxes to electronic mail on the home computer is sent via phone lines. College and high school students can take classes via interactive television carried over fiber optic phone lines.

A new federal law will open the door for companies to offer a dizzying array of interconnected services from telephones to cable TV to computer networks.

"Telephony has really changed people's lives for the better," said Craig Felzien, area manager for Southwestern Bell. "It has allowed people to control their lives more."

Felzien said he and many other Americans can now "telecommute" and conduct business from their homes. "Now from my home, I can telecommute to where I can access my company's e-mail system. I can fax. I can do everything from my home that I can do at my office."

During the recent East Coast blizzard, thousands of people "went to work" by telephone, he said.

No one would have imagined such things when Cape Girardeau's first telephone switchboard was installed in 1896 in the small room in the Sturdivant Bank at Main and Themis.

The Southeast Missouri Telephone Co. switchboard had 50 "drops" and was manned by two women, who plugged in callers.

No numbers were needed because the operators knew everyone by name. Callers asked the operators to connect them to a particular party.

The first telephone was installed in the Boston grocery store on Broadway.

From such beginnings, telephone service in the area has grown dramatically.

By 1921, there were 1,900 telephones in the city of Cape Girardeau and 400 in Jackson. The whole county had about 5,000 telephones.

The local phone company employed 25 operators.

Nationwide, there was one telephone for every 10 people.

Today, there are 360 million separate telephone numbers worldwide. The United States ranks first with about 30 percent of the total, followed by Japan with 13 percent.

Southeast Missouri Telephone Co. served the Cape Girardeau area until Southwestern Bell purchased the system in the 1950s.

At one time, Cape Girardeau residents only had to dial two or three numbers, and people used to share phone service on party lines.

In late 1995, Southwestern Bell eliminated the last remaining party lines in the Cape Girardeau area.

By the end of March, the company expects to have eliminated all party lines it operates in Missouri.

"We no longer have any operators and haven't had in years," Felzien said. "Technology has displaced the need for operators to a large extent through our advanced switching systems."

Southwestern Bell serves about 2.5 million residential and commercial customers in Missouri. Bell is one of 42 telephone companies in the state, but most of them are small, rural systems.

The company is spending millions on technological advances.

It is moving ahead with interactive video communications.

Long-distance learning is taking place at two high schools in Southeast Missouri, where students take classes via two-way educational TV hookups.

Interactive TV also has allowed Southeast Missouri State University to hold long-distance classes with students in Malden and Poplar Bluff.

Southwestern Bell plans to spend millions of dollars on "Classroom of the Future" projects in Missouri.

"We have got lives being saved through telemedicine," Felzien said.

In Callaway County, the technology helped save a life when emergency room doctors conferred by a special telephone network with specialists at another location to revive a heart attack victim.

Law enforcement officials in Kansas City are experimenting with a network that links police, prosecutors and courts to speed caseloads, arraign suspects, save physical commuting time.

Felzien said the phone company is also experimenting with live, interactive picture phones.

The technology involves computers with cameras mounted on top. Callers can view documents and each other while they talk.

Officials at the Cape Girardeau Chamber of Commerce office will participate in using this new technology, Felzien said.