Following that the name changed to General Telephone Company and they relocated to the business district of Sandy Creek, where the Smith Insurance office, now the Video Store (next to Karen’s Kountry Florist) on Harwood Drive is located. The telephone office closed in October 1937, when the telephone system was converted to dial.*

*Joslyn writes: “Nettie Straight, a resident of Sandy Creek, was hired as an operator by the Black River Telephone Company in April 1915. She was promoted to chief operator in January 1925, and held the same position when the company moved into its Sandy Creek office. Mrs. Straight remembers the operators she worked with as being “just like a family.” She said that one thing that drew the operators together was the fact that, because telephones were the quickest form of communication in the days before radio and television, the telephone office functioned as a news agency in small towns such as Sandy Creek. Modern technology finally took its toll on the local phone companies. The office was converted to dial in October of 1937.*