73aussie455

Can anyone help with a '70s car phone setup?
I would like to install a period car phone in my '73 Delta88 and I'm looking for information, pics and an actual period car phone setup.
I already have several Motorola brick handsets, but these would not have been available as these first cell phones were only invented in April '73.

I pretty sure I'm looking for a corded handset and rotary dialer car setup.

Anyone remember these?

allyolds68

The first car phone I remember was a radio phone in 85. You had to go through an operator to reach the person.

I didn't have a true cell phone until 87 or 88. It was a huge bag phone

Lady72nRob71

Are you referring to CB instead?

73aussie455

Not CB, I have several early 27Mhz CB's too.
Early car phones, or radio phones, operated on radio frequency then through to the phone network.
Motorola invented the first cellular network and classic brick phone in 1973, sending the first ever true mobile phone call in April of that year.

allyolds68

From Wikipedia:

Mr Shifty Sidney

I have an old phone I bought at a swap meet several years ago. The old black plastic type with a coiled cord. It does not have a dial with numbers, but more like non numbered push buttons. I will try to get a pict up in the next day or so.

Don W

Octania

As a joke, I once put an old dial phone in my '67 Cutlass.
This was WAY before mobile phones.
It was a dream, like Maxwell Smart's shoe phone.
I just put it on the center hump, it was of course not connected, but I pretended it was.

Must have been about 1978.

73aussie455

Thanks Mike, the development of the mobile phone has a fascinating history.
It took another 10 years from that first cell call in 73 to the general rollout of the network in 83, as you found on wiki. The 'brick' cellphone was available before that only on a very limited network restricted to a select few big cities in the US, but only the very wealthy could afford one. It was a v.large and heavy 'bag phone' version. Motorola used this period to improve the technology for full commercial use in 83.

slantflat

Charlie's Angels had car phones, and this was in the 70s. Fake Hollywoodery maybe? They had giant black receivers with a coiled cord.

jaunty75

Joe Mannix had a car phone in his '68 Dodge Dart convertible.

ThePackRat

Frank Cannon usually had a car phone in his Lincolns.

For sure in the 73-76 Mark IV's he drove.

Not sure if I ever saw him on one in the Mark III's of the very early episodes or the 72 Mark IV's.

jaunty75

Going back even further, Paul Drake (a.k.a. William Hopper), Perry Mason's private eye helper, had a phone in whatever car he was driving around in.

Here he is in his beautiful '57 T-bird.




Here's the phone.





http://lawschoolmatt.com/blog/2013/0...kes-car-phone/

jaunty75

Here's a bag phone.

Octania

ha ha ha
I still have my first bag phone, circa 1990
Hugh Jass Battery
Analog signal
corded handset

73aussie455

That's the one!! I'd love to have that under the dash in my Delta.

Car phones or car radio phones as allyolds68 correctly called them, first appeared in 1949, by AT&T. The receiver and transmitter took up most of the trunk space.

73aussie455

I'd be interested if you were to decide to sell it.

allyolds68

I worked for a construction company in the eighties. The owner had a radio phone. The damn thing blew the car horn every time it rang.


I got my first cell phone in about 1987. 24 year old kid with a cell phone. It wasn't good. I used to like to impress the ladies with a call on my way home. The owner used to call us up at the end of the month and give us crap. I still can still hear him......"Michael, I just wanted to let you know you won"..........me, "Won what Charlie"? ............... Charlie, "You somehow managed a $2000 cell phone bill this month, you beat everyone else by $500"............silence on my end...........Charlie, "Don't let it happen again".


I don't know how I didn't ever get fired. I "won" more than once. I still remember cell time was $1 a minute for non-roaming and roaming was about double that.


This was my first phone. It had a bag around it though: