Category:The Machine

The Machine started playing outbound to a telephone company central office "hot line" on the evening of September 11, 1969. The Machine was headquartered in San Pedo, California — and the central office was the Termino Office in Long Beach — a long local call away.

At the time, there were only four recordings available. The recordings were played along with an announcement of its number. The "hot lines" (technically loop-arounds) were popular with a lot of younger callers then like an early "chat room" in which people, well, actually chatted.

The Machine was pre-dated by a number of others who played jokes or entertainment on the web. One of which was a service known as Vermont — based in the Culver City area. Other services, like ZZZZZZ were to follow The Machine.

The Machine's original phone number was 213-833-3339. Then, to increase its capacity, it was changed to 213-833-2405. After changes in the local central office equipment in San Pedro, it was changed back to 213-833-3339. Then later, with an area code split, to 310-833-3339. The Machine no longer operates on the phone and only few of its original recordings can be found on the web — and not of very good quality.

All of "The Machine" answering machines were designed and custom built By Tom P-0 or Tom P-1. The original machine ran on an acoustic coupling to a black, rotary dial, Bell System wall phone. The phone was answered by an electromechanical solenoid. Later, some a direct electrical feed was added to the phone line, with the phone and solenoid left "for show" in case a phone company employee might drop by for an inspection. (At the time, direct connect to phone lines was not permitted — and the phone company did not offer an answering machine that would play multiple recordings.)

The first The Machine was built with relays and some transistorized equipment to detect ring signals. The last The Machine was built with optical coupling, ICs and reed relays. Eight track tapes were employed for outbound messages — usually about 30 minutes to 45 minutes of different outbound messages available to the callers. Each call would play the next message in the loop.

There were some three different companies or troupes involved in producing The Machine's material — from an original two people in September of 1969. The Machine operated for some 20 years, and involved more than a couple of dozen writers, performers and a few musicians. Alas, life is too short, and several of the individuals who contributed to The Machine have since died.

The Machine's shortest recordings were only a few seconds long. Its longest about 15 minutes long. Material included skits, blackouts, satire, mood pieces, poetry and, yes, jokes. Over the years there were a couple of live performances of its material and perhaps over 1,000 different recordings made. Most are dated, and many of the original commercial satires have now been outdone by real products. Though the service was most popular with teens and people in their early 20s, it did have a good number of older callers. People called from all over the world. Reportedly, some folks at an L.A. based advertising agency used to call to hear something off the wall as part of their creative process.

At its height, The Machine could be heard on phone numbers in San Pedro, Culver City, North Hollywood and Irvine.

Most of its recordings still exist and are archived on 1/4" open reel tape, but not digitized.