THE POST OFFICE TRUNK TELEPHONE SYSTEM AT BRISTOL.--THE COLUMBIA
STAMPING MACHINE.
The Post Office in Bristol commenced to undertake telephone business in
1896. It began with trunk telephone lines working to Bath, Birmingham,
Cardiff, Exeter, London, Taunton, and Weston-super-Mare. At the outset
the conversations averaged about 170 daily. In that same year the
department took over from the National Telephone Co., Cardiff,
Gloucester, Newport and Sharpness lines, and the conversations soon
increased to nearly 400 per day. At the present time the department has
from 1 to 5 (according to size of town) trunk lines to Bath,
Bradford-on-Avon, Birmingham, Cardiff, Exeter, Gloucester, London,
Lydney, Plymouth, Newport, Sharpness, Southampton, Swansea, Taunton,
Tiverton, and Weston-super-Mare. An increased number of wires has had
marked effect in diminishing the delays which at first occurred through
paucity of trunk lines, but as the business is constantly increasing,
the department is still looked to for additional lines. That the better
accommodation is appreciated, however, is indicated by the fact that now
the Bristol conversations average nearly 1,500 a day, or considerably
over a quarter of a million a year. On Sundays the trunk telephones are
available, but use is made of them only to a small extent, there being
only about 150 conversations per Sunday. The total number of trunk wire
transactions throughout the kingdom during the last year, according to
the Postmaster General's annual report, was 13,467,975, or, reckoning
each transaction as involving at least two spoken messages, a total
number of 26,935,950 (an increase of 16.3 per cent. over that of the
preceding year). The revenue was £325,525 (an increase of 18.4 per
cent.), and the average value of each transaction was 5s. 8d. There is a
silence box in the Public Hall of the Bristol Post Office, from which
conversations can be held with all parts of the Kingdom, with Belgium
and France. Of course, the greater number of trunk line telephone
conversations are held through the medium of the National Telephone
Company's local exchange, but many important Bristol firms have
contracted with the Post Office for private telephone wires in actual
connection with the trunk line system, independent altogether of the
National Co.'s exchange.
The intermingling of the National Telephone business with that of the
Post Office telegraphs has had a further development in a system under
which subscribers to the National Company telephone communications to
the Post Office to be sent on thence as telegrams over Post Office
telegraph wires. This privilege is taken advantage of at Bristol to the
extent of seven or eight hundred messages weekly. The accession of the
trunk telephone business to the already over-crowded office has had the
effect of necessitating the detachment of some part of the staff from
the Post Office headquarter premises in Small Street, and the friendly
relations between the Telephone Company and the Post Office have been
further strengthened by the Bristol Post Office having taken certain
rooms in the headquarters of the National Telephone Co., and located its
Returned Letter Office therein.
Another new feature in Post Office development is the use of Stamping
Machines for the rapid obliteration of the postage stamps and for the
impression of the day's date on letters. Quite recently a machine of the
kind has been introduced into the Bristol Post Office. The machine,
which is of modern invention, goes by the name of the "Columbia"
Cancelling Machine, and is manufactured by the Columbia Postal Supply
Company, of Silver Creek, New York, U.S.A. It is said to be in use in
many Post Offices in the large towns of America and other countries. The
public will no doubt have noticed the new cancelling marks on the
postage stamps, as the die and long horizontal lines are very striking.
The cancelling and date marking operation is performed at the rate of
400 or 500 letters per minute. The motor power of the machine is
electricity.
[Illustration: COLUMBIA STAMPING MACHINE.]