Mining telephones

Something different in this post: mining telephones.

Who remembers the first phone below, the Davis of Derby speech powered handset, carried tucked in your shirt on the early power loading faces, you were always talking when you should be listening. They plugged into a socket on the lock-out boxes.
The GEC phone, next to the speech powered handset, was unbelievably still in use when I started at the mine, all of the pit on one party line.

The third phone below, came from Ireland Colliery in Derbyshire I was informed by the seller, it didn’t look like that when I got it!
The fourth phone is a surface phone, but it was intrinsically safe, and was connected to the underground system. The label reads MH direct, which would have been Managers House direct.

The last one below came from Bedlington in Northumberland. The seller said it belonged to an uncle, who was an electrician at Ashington Colliery during WW2. It’s a field telephone, used to tap into the lines when fault finding.

– Information provided by Bosuns Mate.

Credit. Information and photos: Bosuns Mate.