Iva Ruby Hancox (nee Niles) and the History of the Keswick Exchange
Although the invention of the telegraph in 1837 by Samuel Morse was followed by the invention of the telephone in 1876 by Alexander Graham Bell, the New Brunswick Telephone Company was not incorporated until 1888 (1). By 1908, the first telephone exchange had finally arrived in Keswick, and was installed at the home of William Henry Lawrence at McKeen’s Corner (2), presently 30 Route 616, Keswick Ridge. Mrs. Lawrence and her daughters Helen, Celia, and Eunice were the first operators of the magneto switchboard which had seven lines to serve the surrounding area. The country doctor, Dr. Beverly W. Robertson, boarded with the Lawrences at the beginning of his practise in Keswick, and on occasion, he would take a turn at the switch board himself (3).
The early switchboard system was complex for its time. As described by Evelyn Gordon and Harry Grant from their book On the Ridge in the Mactaquac Country:
The switchboard served 66 subscribers on lines numbered from one to ten with lines numbered four, five and six provided for later expansion or possibly for connection with Fredericton....The exchange had subscribers from the Mouth of Keswick to Zealand, on Keswick Ridge, at Jewett’s Mills, and Scotch Lake, at Mactaquac, Queensbury, and Bear Island. The telephone line crossed the St. John just below the present dam site to serve twenty-two subscribers in Kingsclear and Prince William (4).
Further described by Sylvia Yerxa Sharpe in The Madam Keswick: A Village of Two Centuries:
The telephone subscribers of Keswick in 1907 were Charles Blake 10-4, M. C. Dunphy 10-31, C. E. Jones 10-11, Hanford Sloat 10-3, and Leonard Yerxa 10-2... To call someone on another line a short turn of the crank brought the attention of the central office girl to ask “number please?”, after which she connected the line of the caller to the receiver and by means of a small crank on the switchboard, the number was signaled. Example: to call Leonard Yerxa’s, the operator connected the caller to the 10 line, and signaled with the crank two long rings, to call the number 10-2” (5).
The first telephone systems were operated by electric batteries. The central switchboard was powered by 75 wet batteries contained in earthen jars, while the wall telephone units were powered by two dry-cell batteries (6) . We may find this system complicated when compared to the modern dial systems, but the availability of instant communication was an incredible asset to rural communities where farms were far apart, and families sometimes spread over large distances.
Of course, the early system was not without its idiosyncrasies. The ability to “listen in” to other people’s conversations meant that many conversations were not private, and gossip could circulate from one side of the village to the other at great speed. Listening on the line could be done imperceptibly, if you knew the right method. Grant and Gordon explain:
The forked lever in which the receiver was hung when not in use activated two switches. As you slowly let the “forks” rise by removing the receiver, the first switch, absolutely noiseless, would let you in on the conversation which, on a party line, was always in progress. If you allowed the forks to rise farther by so much as a hair’s breadth, the second switch would be closed with a loud click, thus warning the two parties that ‘old so-and-so' was listening (7).
The very motivated eavesdropper could also use a small wedge of wood to insert in the forks so that it only rose to the first click and avoided the second louder click that would alert others of their presence (8).
The young ladies who operated the switchboards were known as the “Central Girls”. The role of the Central Girl was vital in connecting the community and relaying news, especially during WWI. “They would plug all subscribers’ lines into the switchboard and crank out an unusually long ring to get the attention of people, who rushed to listen in. When the operator heard the correct number of clicks, knowing everyone was there to listen, she read the news dispatch” (9). Other community services provided by the Central Girls included a daily weather forecast, which was very useful to the farmers, and connecting cattle and hog buyers from Fredericton to the whereabouts of the Ridge farmers.
By 1914, the Keswick Exchange Office moved from the home of William Henry Lawrence up the road three houses in the little village of Mckeen’s Corner to that of Mowatt Pickard. In 1913 the Pickard farm was bought by Elbridge H. Gilmore who came originally from Williamsburg, near Stanley in York County by way of Burtt’s Corner and Brownville Junction in Maine, where he was a locomotive engineer with the Canadian Pacific Railway. The Keswick Exchange remained at the Gilmore house until December 7, 1969, when telephone operations switched to an automatic dial system (10).
Elbridge Gilmore not only housed the Exchange, he gave it an advantage that other Exchanges in the provinces envied: apples. When he moved to the Pickard farm he planned and developed a large orchard, and his apples were enjoyed by many at the Exchange. Some remember that a stiff breeze would blow the delicious apples right into the open window of the Exchange for the Central Girls to enjoy (11) . As recounted in the 1948 spotlight in the NB Telephone News:
If there is one time of the year when telephone men like to visit the Keswick Exchange, it is in the autumn when apples are ripe. I have been told by William John Henry Seely, District Traffic Superintendent, who has stolen enough apples to know, that there is no MacIntosh Red grown throughout the length and breadth of the St. John River Valley that can equal the size, flavour, or rich colour of the MacIntosh apple grown by Elbridge H Gilmour, in whose home the Keswick Exchange has long been located (12) .
Iva Ruby Hancox (nee Niles)
Recently, the KRHS was contacted by Susan Reid Hancox, Iva’s granddaughter. She wanted to share information about her grandmother's time in Keswick Ridge and at the Keswick Exchange, where she worked from the time she was 17 in 1910, until she married in 1921. From 1915-1920, she was Chief Operator. Iva's parents were Charles and Angelina (McKeen) Niles.
These excerpts are taking from her first-hand, hand-written accounts, which were shared by the family:
“I was born at Mactaquac in the old Jewett house on Oct 19, 1893. I had a twin sister named Ada who died in 1894 of cholera infantism. Our doctor was Dr. Coburn. He travelled in the summer by horse in a carriage and in the winter by horse and sleigh.
We lived at Mactaquac for some time. Our rent for the house was only $1 per month. Then we moved to Lower Line Queensbury. When my father worked on the Jim Cliff farm, he also worked for Byron McNally at McNally’s ferry. Then we moved from there to Keswick Ridge to my uncle's house on the road to McGinley’s Ferry. Then my father worked at the Douglas Boom and ran rafts down the St. John River, and in the winter, he cut pulp wood at $1.23 a cord. Some days he would average 1 ¾ cords a day with a crosscut saw for A.E. Hanson of Fredericton. We lived at Keswick Ridge for some time, then my father bought an 80-acre farm from Garfield Grant at Jewett’s mills. Then Garfield Grant moved to Presque Isle, Maine on a potato farm. My father paid $1700 for the farm.
I attended school at Keswick Ridge. I was in grade 9 when I left school and went to work as a telephone operator in Keswick Exchange. In 1915, my sister Mae worked there. She was chief operator when she left to get married. They were married in the lawn in front of our house, by Rev. Mr. Fields, and we had the reception at our house.
The telephone office was in William Lawrence’s house and the manager of the NB Telephone Company was S.B. Ebbett. Some of the linemen’s names were Fred Nesbit, Mel McCarrol, Clarence Emmett, Mr. Shea, John Turner and Ernest Fraser. I worked there for 8 years with my sister Mae on different shifts. Also Helen Jewett, Clara Walsh, Agnes Buckley, Frankie McLain, Minnie Smullin and Alice Gilmore and Sadie Jackson. I was sent once up to Southhampton Exchange for a spare operator for one month, then I came back to Keswick Ridge.
John Turner one of the linemen used to get me to connect 75 batteries back of the switchboard, and that’s how the switchboard was run by batteries, also the telephones in homes and business places. The telephone was screwed on the wall with two batteries to run it and a crank to turn to ring anyone. Everyone could listen in on others talking and laugh about it. They thought it was so wonderful having telephones.
I lived at Jewett’s Mills 1 ½ miles from the telephone office and I used to walk back and forth over each day to my work. It took me ¾ of an hour to walk one way. I hardly ever got a drive with anyone as cars were few and far between. About the only one that had a car was Dr. B. W. Robertson. Sometimes he would be going my way on a call and would stop and take me in and give me a lift which I appreciated. In the winter the going was tough. I used to wade in the deep snow above my knees when there would be a bad snowstorm and drifting snow. Not a soul on the road but me. I remember one winter I took sick with the flu and I was at the switch board working. I phoned Dr. Robertson to come see me and he came and said that I had the flu and that I had to be taken home, so he wrapped me up in his fur coat and took me home and I was in bed for over a week. I used to buy milk from Dr. Robertson, as they had a cow and the milk was only 15 cents a quart at that time in 1915.
There was no electric lights then, we used Kerosene lamps and burned wood in a box heater. We had to wipe up our office floors and keep things nice and clean and empty our own piss pots, ha ha. The night operator had a mantle bed and we did get a few minutes of sleep and there was a buzzer on the switch board for the night calls and if anyone rang, it woke us up.
In 1913 I had my picture taken sitting in the telephone office door which was moved to Elbridge Gilmore’s house, and another picture of me taken at the switchboard and another of me on my way to the telephone office and a picture of my house at Jewett’s Mills.
In 1915 there was some telephone operators from Fredericton (…?) and we had our picture taken, of myself, my sister Mae, Frankie McLean, Ethel McCarrol and Gertie Clark.
In 1920 I worked in Fredericton as telephone operator. Alec Thompson was the manager then. He didn’t want me to leave Keswick. Finally, he consented to take me on as night operator in Fredericton. I left the office in 1921 and got married to William H. Hancox. The minister that married us was Rev. Z. L Fash, Baptist minister. Then a reception followed at my home at Jewett’s Mills. and from then on I was a busy housewife having 7 children in all. In 1964 my husband died and now I am a widow with 18 grandchildren and a great grandchild” (13).
-Mrs. William Hancox, nee Iva Niles
Bittersweetly, the time of the central switchboard has passed. Presently, telephones are mainly cellular, and share little in common with Iva’s memories; however, the “Central Girls” shaped their communities and were fearless pioneers in early tele-communication.
[1] Robert E. Babe, “Telephones,” in The Canadian Encyclopedia, (July 13, 2015), https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/telephones.
[2] C.A Kee, “Keswick Exchange”, NB Telephone News 19, no. 2 (February 1948): 4.
[3] Sylvia Yerxa Sharpe, The Madam Keswick: A Village of Two Centuries, (Fredericton: Centennial Print and Litho Ltd, 1984), 195-196.
[4] Evelyn Gordon and Harry Grant, On the Ridge: In the Mactaquac Country, (Fredericton: Centennial Print and Litho Ltd, 1975), 117.
[5] Sharpe, Madam, 195-196.
[6] Gordon and Grant, Ridge, 124.
[7] Gordon and Grant, Ridge, 126.
[8] Gordon and Grant, Ridge, 126.
[9] Sharpe, Madam, 196.
[10] Gordon and Grant, Ridge, 127.
[11] Kee, Exchange, 4.
[12] Kee, Exchange, 4.
[13] Iva Ruby Hancox, nee Niles. Handwritten account, emailed document from great-granddaughter to author, August 1, 2022.
Bibliography
Babe, Robert E. “Telephones”. In The Canadian Encyclopedia. July 13, 2015. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/telephones
Gordon, Evelyn & Harry Grant. On the Ridge: In the Mactaquac Country. Fredericton: Centennial Print and Litho Ltd, 1975.
Kee, C.A. “Keswick Exchange”. NB Telephone News, 19, no. 2 (February 1948): 4.
Yerxa Sharpe, Sylvia. The Madam Keswick: A Village of Two Centuries. Fredericton: Centennial Print and Litho Ltd, 1984.
