By Robert Lucke
1902 Historical records indicate first telephone office was opened in Havre by E.V. Hauser. His company provided both telephone and electric service.
1912 Hauser sold his operation to the Montana Power Company.
1915 Mountain States Telephone and Telegraph Company (part of the AT&T Bell system) purchased the Havre operation from Montana Power. An updated common battery system was installed the same year and operators provided service to about 700 telephones.
1920 Operator operations relocated to Montana Power Co. building, a one-story brick building at 319 Second St.
1950 A building addition was constructed to provide room for growing number of operators handling connections for 3,289 Havre telephones.
1959 Construction was completed on a new phone company building at the corner of Fifth Avenue and Second Street.
1960 A new $1.25 million switching system allowed Havre customers to dial their own local calls for the first time. Mayor James Davey made the first long-distance call through the new system, calling his brother-in-law in Los Angeles. There were 5,600 telephones in Havre.
1963 Direct Distance Dialing came to Havre, allowing customers to dial their own long-distance calls without operator assistance.
1965 A new microwave radio system was completed, connecting Havre office to Malta, and on to Great Falls. Microwave radio technology provided improved long-distance call quality and more capacity.
1969 Touch-Tone service came to Havre. Company officially adopted Mountain Bell as its trade name.
1983 New zero-plus dialing allowed calling-card and operator-assisted calls to be dialed by customers, significantly reducing the need for operators. Operator operations were consolidated in Billings and the Havre operator office closed.
1986 Mountain Bell completed a five-year $80 million program to upgrade rural service to one-party lines, eliminating all 4-party and 8-party lines.
1997 Caller ID and other advanced calling services introduced in Havre.
2000 7,000 telephones in Havre.
