[Jeffhs]

I live in a very small town (population just under 3100) in northeastern Ohio. There are no more pay phones here. The last one I remember seeing was in the supermarket three blocks down the road from my apartment. That one was removed a couple years ago, as was the phone outside the convenience store near the lake, just up the road from here.

I guess the sheer popularity of cell phones pretty much killed pay phones as everyone, or so it seems, has at least a basic cell phone these days, with many folks upgrading to so-called smartphones as soon as their wireless carrier makes them an offer. (I did this a couple of years ago, and have never looked back.) The wired phone carriers aren't out of business yet, but they are nowhere near the communications giants they once were before wireless came in. I know folks who don't have landline phones in their homes anymore, instead using a cell phone for day-to-day communications and other business.

"The times they are a'changin'", as the old song says; this is very true nowadays with just about everything, including the telephone, which has come a very long way since the days of hand-cranked wall phones of the 1900s (the ones where you asked an operator to dial or to connect you to the number you wanted to call) and slightly earlier.

If he were alive today, Alexander Graham Bell would be astounded to see the telephone system he invented (and after whom the Bell System was named) having come this far. I honestly don't think he could have imagined a day in which people would be able to call others on a portable phone that can fit in a pocket and is run by a battery, much less be able to do their banking, shopping, etc. from just about anywhere, just by using a smartphone.