Coffee Shop Conversation

There were over 2.1 million pay phones in the U.S. at their peak in 1999, but now the technology is mostly relegated to nostalgia. Few wall-mounted pay phones linger in strip malls, and the silver and blue phone booths are mostly gone from the busy streets they once dotted in many parts of the U.S. Pay phones have become so rare that the FCC stopped requiring audits of them in 2018.

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What Grocery Shopping Was Like The Year You Were Born

Ward Bond was born Wardell Edwin Bond in Benkelman, Nebraska, on April 9, 1903, the son of a lumberyard worker. When he was 16 his family moved to Denver and he attended school at Denver's East High School. He then enrolled at the University of Southern California and it was through playing American football for the USC team that he entered movies. Also playing for the USC team was John Wayne, then called Marion Morrison, who became a lifelong friend.

Paul Newman and Jackie Gleason established a friendship on the set of "The Hustler" (1961). At one point, Newman got a little cocky about his newfound pool skills and challenged the much more experienced Gleason to a $50 bet on a game. Newman broke, then it was Gleason's turn. He knocked all 15 balls in and Newman never got another shot. Gleason recalled that the next day Newman paid him off with 5000 pennies.