Wikipedia has an interesting history of manual switchboards[1]; they broadly died out in about the '60s with some still used in rural areas into the '90s. And

Wikipedia has an interesting history of manual switchboards[1]; they broadly died out in about the '60s with some still used in rural areas into the '90s. And while the switchboards were automated, I don't think even today our phone systems are "dial only." Certainly through the '90s I recall dialing an operator for international and reverse charge calls and I think operators still serve customers with disabilities. That's not even counting all the customer support positions that are mostly redirecting calls. The funny thing is you'd think the web would have ended it, but more sites are adding chat boxes, or they want your phone number to set up an account... [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Switchboard_operator https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Switchboard_operator