Cheaper Three Minutes

When American Telephone & Telegraph Co. inaugurated radio-telephone service in 1927, few people except bankers and politicians could afford to use it. A three-minute Manhattan-to-London call cost $75. During the first year of the service only 2,500 calls were made. The following year A. T. & T. was able to make the first rate cut, London calls dropping to $45. In 1930 another cut was made, bringing London down to $30. Record day on this schedule was last Christmas when 360 overseas calls were handled in 24 hours. Last week A. T. & T. made still another bid for more radio-telephone business by filing with the Federal Communications Commission reductions running as high as 42% for weekdays, 57% for Sundays.

To London the weekday rate will be $21 for three minutes, on Sunday as low as $15. A similar reduction will apply on calls from Manhattan to Paris, Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro and Lima, Peru. The present $33 charge to Berlin and Santiago, Chile, will be cut to $24 on weekdays, $18 on Sundays. Where it now costs $21 to call Panama City or Guatemala, the reduced rates will be $12 and $9. To London, Paris and Berlin, U. S. telephone subscribers may call at night for the same price as the Sunday charge.

Fortnight ago A. T. & T. announced that the FCC had authorized a new radio- telephone service that will leave New Zealand the only country in the world with more than 100,000 subscribers which does not have radio-telephone communication with the U. S.* From an A. T. & T. radio station at Dixon, Calif, calls will go direct from the U. S. to Shanghai removing the previous necessity of routing them through Japan. Switchboard work at the U. S. end will be done in the company's Chinatown office in San Francisco.

*Calls to Australia are routed through London.

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