Dialing up memories: The year phone numbers became 7 digits

Editor’s Note: As Lexington celebrates the 250th anniversary of its founding, the Herald-Leader and kentucky.com each day throughout 2025 will share interesting facts about our hometown. Compiled by Liz Carey, all are notable moments in the city’s history - some funny, some sad, others heartbreaking or celebratory, and some just downright strange.

Changes in Lexington’s population and the popularity of telephones meant a change in the way we called one another.

On March 4, 1963, newspapers reminded Lexingtonians to remember using seven digits phone numbers when calling people on the phone, warning that calling the five-digit numbers they used the day before could tie-up phone lines and cause unnecessary delays.

The change was a sign of the times for the growing city.

Just a year before, one could find advertisements for Hutchinson Drugs listing its phone number as 2-5055. But on March 4, 1963, the phone system changed, requiring all phone numbers to move to the seven-digit system we know today.

Up until the 1950s, phone numbers in the United States consisted of a telephone exchange name followed by a four- or five-digit number.

That system gave us telephone numbers like Pennsylvania 6-5000, and Maida Vale 3499 (Dial M for Murder). In the late 1950s, officials recognized that the telephone system would outgrow the available amount of numbers by about 1975.

In 1962, officials estimated the number of telephones in the country would equal its population of 280 million by 1985 and increase to 600 million phones for 340 million people in the year 2000.

Plans began to switch to a new phone system, using seven numbers, as well as area codes for long-distance calling.

Lexington’s population was growing. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, in 1960 Lexington’s population was 62,810. Just 10 years later, it had boomed to 108,137.

In 1963, Lexington switched to the seven number system. For local calls, all you had to do was dial the seven-digit number. To call long-distance, you had to dial a 1, then the area code, and then the number.

Also, just for any kids under the age of say… 25… if you made a long-distance call to another area code, you were charged by the minute. Imagine calling your friend in Cincinnati for 30 minutes and ending up with a $10 bill for the call.

Lexington, Central Kentucky and Northern Kentucky are served by the 859 area code, while the rest of the state is divided into four other area codes – 270 and 364 for western Kentucky and the western half of South Central Kentucky, 502 serving the Louisville and Frankfort areas, and 606, which covers eastern Kentucky.

The 10-digit phone number system has more than 10 billion possible numbers for the country. And, of course, now, long-distance calling is just part of the telephone system.

We’ve come a long way since Echo Valley 2-6809 turned into 867-5309.

Have a question or story idea related to Lexington’s 250-year history? Let us know at 250LexKy@gmail.com.