MIflyer
1st Lieutenant
Back in the late 1950's Western Electric was building the radio guidance system for the Titan I ICBM. They had a class of USAF officers learning how the system worked and the highly technical training dragged a bit at times and there was a bit of dozing, especially after lunch. Finally they decided that each day after lunch they would take the officers on a local field trip in the plant and show them some new and hopefully stimulating technology the company was working on.
The first day they took them to see the new telephone system the company was about to introduce to service in a small community, in order to find out how it worked in the real world. It was a system called "Touch Tone" and featured buttons on the phone that produced tones for the dialing rather the old rotary dials. One of the officers looked at the Touch Tone phone and then pushed down all of the buttons.
The system then locked up and refused to respond to anything anyone tried to do. Plans to introduce it into service were delayed while it was redesigned. None of the WECO engineers had thought to try pushing down all of the buttons.
The first day they took them to see the new telephone system the company was about to introduce to service in a small community, in order to find out how it worked in the real world. It was a system called "Touch Tone" and featured buttons on the phone that produced tones for the dialing rather the old rotary dials. One of the officers looked at the Touch Tone phone and then pushed down all of the buttons.
The system then locked up and refused to respond to anything anyone tried to do. Plans to introduce it into service were delayed while it was redesigned. None of the WECO engineers had thought to try pushing down all of the buttons.