While enjoying the views along Edgecombe Avenue in Upper Manhattan, I spotted this rusted sign containing an old two-letter phone exchange, once ubiquitous in New York until they were phased out in the 1960s.
The FA exchange is a mystery. Gun Hill is a road in the Bronx, and the Gun Hill Fence Company, founded in 1959, still operates in the Bronx, now in a site on Boston Road.
Fordham is my best (but probably not accurate) guess. These old two-letter telephone exchanges are fun to find in hidden pockets of New York City.
Tags: Edgecombe Avenue, FA phone exchange Bronx, Gun Hill Road Bronx, old phone exchanges, old two-letter phone numbers
Ephemeral New York 
December 11, 2017 at 7:28 am |
Could the ‘FA’ telephone exchange stand for: FAr Rockaway, Queens? Could there have been a branch of this company
located in this area of NYC?
July 18, 2022 at 10:01 am |
The letters always represented the first two letters of the exchange, and as far as I can tell, they never related to anything in the neighborhood. I grew up in East New York, Brooklyn and our exchange was CL, for Cloverdale.
December 11, 2017 at 7:41 am |
…or perhaps this mysterious “FA” represents: FArmingdale.
Of course the most alluring prefix was ‘BUTTERFIELD’ as in the title ‘BUTTERFIELD 8’ (which was a completely made-up feature by the author of the story.) This was the telephone number for Elizabeth Taylor – who received an Academy Award for that come-hither cinema number!
(Hot Cha Cha!!!)
December 11, 2017 at 9:10 am |
FA was for FAIRBANKS.
December 11, 2017 at 10:53 am |
i’m guessing farragut
December 11, 2017 at 11:46 am |
FA was Fairbanks: see http://forgotten-ny.com/2008/02/running-the-numbers-part-2-more-nyc-telephone-exchanges/
December 11, 2017 at 2:28 pm |
Fairbanks, of course! I should have known Forgotten NY would have that one.
December 11, 2017 at 5:41 pm |
I could swear I left a message about this last night, did that come in?
December 11, 2017 at 6:34 pm |
According to the lists, it was FAculty, FAirfax, or FAirview.
December 11, 2017 at 7:12 pm |
FArragut, FAculty, FAirbanks, FAr Rockaway from The Telephone Exchange Name Project – http://ourwebhome.com/TENP/TENproject.html
December 11, 2017 at 8:57 pm |
Ephemeral — You have created ‘a monster’ with the ‘FA’ telephone exchange — Hahahahaaaaa!
The most famed NYC telephone number with a musical connection is the hit tune by The GLENN MILLER Band / Orchestra. The song’s title: “PEnnsylvania 6 – 5000.” The most famous recording includes the song’s musicians chanting the telephone number at the end of each stanza.
The telephone number –legend has it — is the longest continuiously-in-use number by a New York City business. It is listed as belonging to the famed ‘Hotel Pennsylvania.’ The lodging is located in the vicinity of Penn Station. (The actual number is 736-5000.) The telephone company also chose “PE” to represent PEnnsylvania — associated with the station / not the state.
Want to hear the song? Here are a pair of links below —
GLENN MILLER’S Orchestration / music only
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
THE ANDREWS SISTERS / with lyrics
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
CAUTION — Listen to either of these recordings and you will be humming the song forrrrrrrrrrrr hours!
December 11, 2017 at 10:26 pm |
I love it!
December 13, 2017 at 9:31 pm |
Love this musical trip down Memory Lane! Also, don’t forget, “Take the A Train”.
December 11, 2017 at 10:09 pm |
Thank you Audrey! And don’t forget the other famous old NYC phone exchange from Sorry, Wrong Number: MUrray Hill 4-0098
December 11, 2017 at 11:27 pm |
I was trying to remember that Ephemeral – thanks! Did you look that up; or was that off the top of your head? Lol… Impressive…
And didn’t the Honeymooners have one? Did they live in Brooklyn? Did they even have a phone? Or did they have to borrow the more consumer oriented Ed & Trixie’s? My aging mind is forgetting all the really important stuff…
December 13, 2017 at 9:33 pm
Did the Honeymooners live in Canarsie? Seems familiar…
December 13, 2017 at 11:28 pm
Well I could stand it no longer – hence looked it up.
Apparently Ralph & Alice Kramden (& Ed & Trixie etc.) lived at 328 Chauncey Street in Bushwick. (That’s in Brooklyn for you sane people who live in the rest of the world).
But – wait for it – apparently the writers thought that address was in Bensonhurst. Even though it is a real address that is in Bushwick. So depending on one’s perspective they live in Bensonhurst *or* Bushwick.
When Alice got a phone – angering Ralph a lot w/ that – the ‘exchange number’ (lol) was BEnsonhurst 0-7741
And Trilby – it was Alice’s mom who lived in Canarsie. Lol.
I sourced all of that from a funny thread on city-data. Here’s a sample of a post from someone w/ the screenname BugsyPal: “The Kramden’s apartment looks like something barely above what you’d see in a Jacob Riis (photo)”… Lol! Then everyone goes on to describe their NYC apartments that looked like the Kramden’s – only w/ tubs in kitchens & water closets in common hallways. I have said that here on Ephemeral’s blog re. my East First St. apartment (only I had a separate bath & kitchen). I also said it was like the apartment in the late 70s film ‘Eraserhead’.
Here’s that link from the brilliant New Yorkers & Brookynites who knew the address & phone number… I mean ‘exchange’ number… lol… of the Kramdens:
http://www.city-data.com/forum/new-york-city/2599414-ralph-alice-kramden-lived-bensonhurst-2.html
December 11, 2017 at 11:28 pm |
As an ‘Old Broadcaster’ I must add, the greatest production of the play ‘SORRY, WRONG NUMBER’ was by the great actress, Agnes Morehead. Her radio show recording of the script is astounding. It was heralded as so outstanding, a special tape of her presentation was put into the Library of Congress’s archives. Barbara Stanwyck ‘stole’ the movie role but the most memorable talent portraying t’he ill wife who hears a murder plot over the telephone’ is the magnificent AGNES MOREHEAD.
December 13, 2017 at 9:38 pm
Oh! Those old radio broadcasts! I’d give a lot to be able to listen to what I did as a child, including “The Shadow”, “Suspense”, “Inner Sanctum”, “Nick Carter, Private Detective”, etc. etc. On a local A.M. radio station (don’t recall call numbers but they advertise as “The Answer”), on Saturday nights at about 11:00 p.m. there is a show called “Hollywood 360” which plays many of the old radio shows….talk about tripping down Memory Lane…..
December 13, 2017 at 10:44 pm
The ‘Suspense’ show is linked here in my response to Ephemeral – Trilby. They’re at archive.org
December 13, 2017 at 11:08 pm
Yes, and thank you for the link, Zoe. So, do you listen to “Hollywood360”, as well? I thought I was the only fan from around here (don’t forget – you used to live on or near 4th Ave. and 86th St. in Brooklyn and I’d observed that we must have passed each, probably on the way to or from Century 21 back then.
December 13, 2017 at 11:46 pm
I never heard of ‘Hollywood 360’ before now Trilby. The link I gave here (one of them) was to ‘Studio360’. A podcast & radio show about all & sundry in the arts (mostly) hosted by a writer.
The short segment I linked to is an interview w/ the daughter of the woman who wrote ‘Sorry Wrong Number’.
December 14, 2017 at 6:56 pm
Oh, well, “Studio 360” and what I listen to, “Hollywood 360” sound so similar that I’ll bet one is the off-shoot of the other. “Hollywood…” is on Saturday nights…I tune in at midnight and it continues until 3:00 a.m. featuring, last week, “Phil Harris and Alice Faye” show from 1950, “The Whistler” from, I think 1946, and the like. I think they’re podcast, as well. I fondly remember listening to those radio shows as a child.
December 14, 2017 at 7:17 pm
I searched ‘Hollywood 360’ after you mentioned it here Trilby. It looks really interesting. Thanks for that – I look forward to listening to it.
December 12, 2017 at 3:33 am |
I will never forget it! My dad grew up listening to the radio and he found a cassette version of the Agnes Morehead recording and played it for us kids. It was terrifying…I can still hear the phone operator saying the number and the train and the screams!
December 12, 2017 at 4:17 am
Here’s the Studio360 interview w/ the daughter of the woman who wrote it & also an expert on the radio play – Ephemeral & everyone. (Also it’s at archive.org … The show was called ‘Suspense’. So search ‘Radio / Suspense / Sorry Wrong Number / Agnes Moorehead’. But watch out those old radio plays are addictive!).
This is fascinating. I’m really glad we’ve stopped using the word ‘invalid’ (as in not valid). Her daughter says here that her mom based it on real people she didn’t like!
https://www.wnyc.org/story/sorry-wrong-number/
December 12, 2017 at 4:27 am
Here’s a link to the original Agnes Moorehead Suspense/Sorry Wrong Number 1943 radio play at archive.org
https://archive.org/details/Suspense430525SorryWrongNumberWestCoast
December 13, 2017 at 9:40 pm
Hooray and thanks, Zoe!!! I know what I’m going to be listening to in a few minutes….Without reading your comment about “Hollywood360”, I just referred to it….should have known you’d be on top of that greatness! Thanks again!
December 13, 2017 at 11:10 pm
Ephemeral, I’ll bet your dad and I were listening to the same programs at the same time back in the 1950s. I miss that world so much.
December 12, 2017 at 6:11 pm |
Thanks Zoe! I have to be careful where I listen to this because it’s going to terrify me all over again.
December 11, 2017 at 10:47 pm |
Fairbanks old telephone exchange.
December 12, 2017 at 12:33 am |
FAculty is the one I most often saw or heard. It would be interesitng to find out where that came from since I don’t recall it as a neighborhood.
December 12, 2017 at 4:14 am |
FAirbanks was a Bronx exchange ..
December 12, 2017 at 12:20 pm |
Our old phone numbers were PErshing 1-5230, and for the photography business they ran out of the house, the wall phone in the kitchen (with a cord long enough to reach the stove) was PYramid 6-7996.
December 12, 2017 at 3:19 pm |
The “Bronx telephone directory, Winter 1939-40” lists this exchange as “FAirbanks 4” on page 8. See also various listings in the body of the directory.
https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/f4064940-97cc-0135-0705-179ed179d554
December 12, 2017 at 6:11 pm |
What a treasure, thanks for the link!
December 15, 2017 at 7:27 pm |
In the Village growing up OR stood for Oregon. We moved to the Upper Westside and had TR which stood for Trafalgar. Nice memory, thanks.
December 17, 2017 at 10:37 pm |
In that part of the Bronx – where I lived in the 1960s when those letters were still used – FA = Fairbanks. I recall my old phone number, which we learned to recite Fairbanks 4-etc etc.
December 23, 2017 at 8:26 pm |
I was “ALgonquin” growing up in Greenwich Village.
December 25, 2017 at 6:51 pm |
The exchange was FAirbanks The Bronx was area code 212 back when alpha exchanges existed. I know because my Aunt Connie’s phone number 9who lived on Gunther Ave near White Plains Road in the Bronx at that time) was (212) FA4-7107.
May 14, 2018 at 5:18 am |
[…] undergone upgrades over the years. But you wouldn’t know it from the sign, with its wonderful two-letter prefix on the management office’s phone […]
September 10, 2020 at 9:20 pm |
Fairbanks
October 29, 2020 at 3:14 pm |
FA stands for FAirbanks
October 3, 2021 at 8:35 pm |
FÃ I believe was Fort Apache
October 4, 2021 at 11:50 am |
Gun Hill Road got its name from the American Revolution. It was a artillery defense line.
Featherbed Lane got its name from something related…supposedly the local housewives dumped the contents of their featherbeds on the road to reduce the noise of retreating Continental troops.
July 18, 2022 at 9:56 am |
The telephone exchanges always consisted of the first two letters of the word. For instance, I lived in Brooklyn and my exchange was CL, which stood for Cloverdale.