Frank H. Woods Telephone Pioneer Museum

I lived in Lincoln all my life and not once have I notice this tiny museum. I would drive by on my way to a track meet or a band competition but on no occasion has my eye came upon it. One day that changed when my English professor mention the museum.
Named after the founder of Lincoln Telephone Company, Frank H. Woods, the museum tells the history of one of the great luxury's we have today, the telephone. It consists of over 500 telephones, switchboards, and even an old 1929 Chevrolet installers truck. It may be little but sure holds a lot of history.
As I walked into the museum my mine was sent back in time. Walls covered with telephones surrounded me as I went from room to room. Each one was unique in it's own way. I even found a Ketchup bottle phone in one of the displays. The most compelling exhibit to me was the big switchboards where the operators would work at. It use to be that the telephone director was one long sheet of paper posted in the middle of town. If you wanted to make a call you would pick up the line and tell the operator the name of the person your calling and then they would switch you over to them. Back then lines were not that private. One line would be shared by multiple numbers of families. As one family would be talking on a line, another could pick up the phone and listen in on their conversation.
In one room there was the recreation of the office of Frank H. Woods. His original desk that he worked on was also in this exhibit. It's mind blowing to think how his impact is what helped Lincoln have the communication opportunities that we have today.
I couldn't help but think about how much we take for granite what we have today. I talked to a museum volunteer, Gerald, who had worked with the telephone company for 30 years. He said that when he first started he had to hand twist the wire and now a machine does it for us. Everything from communicating and creating it is easier now. Just like this museum we sometimes forget or don't notice how far the telephone has came.