’Phone Service Run by Robots - Only one man needed at new exchange
Girl G.P.O. telephone operators took off their headphones at Rushden yesterday afternoon and looked almost unbelievingly at the switchboard in front of them. In a matter of moments it had become a relic of the past and all calls were going through an automatic exchange in another part of the town.

The switch-over from the College Street manual exchange, which has served the town since 1925, to the new building which, though only recently equipped, was put up in 1939, took place smoothly at 1.30.

In place of 11 girls and four men the new exchange will be staffed by one man. When the one man is not there it will function just the same.

Most of the complicated apparatus is attached in small, easily-removed units to wide frames which are 10ft. 6in high and placed in parallel rows, the connecting wires going overhead.

The main distribution frame sorts out the individual line from the thick incoming cables, and other frames contain the gadgets that respond to the dialling and interconnect the lines – the line-finders and group-selectors which might well be described as mechanical operators.

On a further rack are 1,200 small meters, each registering every call that each subscriber makes. This is perhaps the most up-to-date feature of the exchange, for the system is one of multi-metering, the figures advancing one, two, three or four times according to the value of the call. By this means Rushden subscribers can dial direct to people at Kettering, Wellingborough and Wollaston, but without meters capable of registering the varied charges these calls would have to go through an operator.

Only one or two exchanges in the whole of the Coventry Area can offer this service.

The power board of the exchange handles the electricity to ring the bells and has a machine which produces the four distinctive tones for “dialling,” “ringing” “number engaged” and “number unobtainable.” This machine runs off the mains. If it fails an alarm bell rings and an alternative machine running off batteries comes automatically into service. Another section of the panel attends in the same robot-like way to the recharging of the batteries which are housed in a separate room. The batteries are in duplicate to facilitate maintenance.

The main distribution frame	The maze of wires carries your voice	Batteries
At zero hour hundreds of wedges were ripped out and the lines thus brought into circuit

All recorded
All kinds of traffic through the exchange are automatically recorded for easy reference, and it will even be possible to tell how many attempted calls have failed.

Faults in the general working are announced by alarm bells and localised by signal lights. When the exchange is unattended the alarm signals go through to engineers at Northampton who will call out someone to deal with the trouble.

There is about eight miles of wire and cable in the exchange, which has equipment for 1,140 lines and space for 2,400. At present there are 900 subscribers, who were making or receiving 5,000 calls a day through the manual exchange.

Miss Gilbert, supervisor of the discarded exchange, is transferring to Guildford. Four girls and two men transfer to Irthlingborough, Kettering and Bedford, but the other operators and the assistant supervisor (Miss Butler) are leaving the service for other jobs.

Mr. F. J. Ashton, technical officer at the new exchange, has been working there since installations began 12 months ago.

Phone numbers change in Rushden
NINE hundred telephone users in Rushden have had their numbers changed on Wednesday, January 14, as the town moves from four figure numbers to five.

The change, which will affect users with numbers from 3000 to 3999 will be changed by a straightforward addition of 5 to the existing numbers. So the new range will be 53000 to 53999.

The change had been made necessary because of the high demand for telephones in the area.

Converting the lines from four figures to five will allow the post office to make more numbers available at a future date. The change takes place at 9 am.

Pleased with Rushden phone changeover
EVERYTHING went as planned when nine hundred telephone users in Rushden had their numbers changed last week, as the town moved from four figure numbers to five. The change, which affected users with numbers from 3000 to 3999, was made by a straightforward addition of 5 to existing numbers. So the new range is 53000 to 53999.

The change became necessary because of the high demand for telephones in the area.

A spokesman for the GPO said:- "The change over went: very smoothly and according to plan. At present there have been no hitches and we have had no complaints.

"We are more than pleased with things."

Rushden is the second local town to have its numbers changed in the past two months. In December numbers in Wellingborough ranged from four figures six.

Will almost double number of phone lines
Work on Rushden’s new telephone exchange which had already been going on for several months is likely to continue until the end of the year.

Following completion of the £400,000 work, equipment worth £350,000 will be installed during 1978. Some of the equipment will be transferred from the existing exchange across the street at Victoria Road a Post Office spokesman said.

The new exchange, intended to cope with Rushden area expansion into the 1990s will have 15,000 lines. The present exchange has 9,000.

Work on the site dominates the street and a major feature of the area for the next few months is likely to be the crane rising about 200 feet into the air above the site.

Northampton Chronicle & Echo, 23^rd November 1979

New exchange takes the strain

A NEW electronic exchange came into service at Rushden yesterday to supplement the existing electro-mechanical exchange.

Subscribers who were served by temporary equipment have received a change of telephone number on transfer to the electronic unit.

Their numbers in the range 51000 to 51999 are changed by replacing the initial digits 51 with 311, for example Rushden 51737 (5 digits) become Rushden311737 (6 digits) and callers dialling the old 51XXX number will hear a recorded announcement advising of the change.

The STD code for the new six digit numbers will be 0933.

Subscribers whose numbers have been changed will also need to dial a different code for Bedford. The new code to dial via the electronic exchange will be 83, but subscribers not involved in the number change should continue to dial 8783.

A recorded announcement will be connected to assist subscribers served by the electronic exchange if they dial 8783 for Bedford instead of 83, and they have been sent an amended dialling code booklet, together with a covering letter, to advise of the changes.

The new exchange has cost over £¾ million to install

Northampton Chronicle & Echo, 11^th August 1976

Exchange opens soon

BUILDING work on the new Rushden automatic telephone exchange is nearly finished.

Being provided for the Post Office by the Government's Property Services Agency at a cost of £350,000, the building is on the south side of Victoria Road near the existing exchange. It is due for completion this month.

The new exchange, to be brought into service towards the end of 1978, will be equipped with the latest type of electronic exchange equipment and provide an additional 3,200 lines for the area.

Northampton Chronicle & Echo, 4^th July 1983

Phones improved

TELEPHONE users in Rushden are the latest to benefit from a £2 million modernisation programme by British Telecom.

Due to improvements in the dialling system Rushden customers will no longer need to dial the local code 87 for Wellingborough numbers from 8 a.m. on Wednesday, July 6.

At the same time the area code for all Rushden customers will become 0933 for distant callers.

Until 1985 distant callers will still get through if they dial the old 09334 code but after that time they will get the number unobtainable tone.

A new green dialling code booklet explaining the changes is currently being sent to all Rushden customers.