The Hello Girls: From Telephone Switchboards to the Front Lines

Author: Christine Skirbunt

With the invention of the telephone in the late 19th century a new profession was also invented: that of switchboard operator. This job was vital because, in the earliest days of the telephone, people could not dial each other directly. They needed an intermediary – known as a telephone operator – to manually relay their call on a central switchboard. Without the switchboard operator, there was no telephone.

In the beginning, telephone companies hired teenage boys to fill these jobs and to connect calls, but this avenue proved disastrous. The boys lacked patience, played pranks on customers, and even cursed over the line – behavior unacceptable in professional voice-to-voice communication, let alone to Victorian sensibilities!

No, the job of a switchboard operator took concentration, good people skills, and quick hands. Thus, in 1878, Boston’s Telephone Dispatch Company made a bold change by hiring Emma Nutt, a woman with a soothing, cultured voice, as the first ever female telephone operator. Customer response was so overwhelmingly positive that the unruly boys were all swiftly replaced by women. Women operators were more polite to customers, more dependable, and even faster at completing calls. As the telephone network expanded, so did the demand for operators. In 1910, there were 88,000 female telephone operators in the US. By 1920, there were almost 180,000, and by 1930, there were 235,000. (The Rise and Fall of Telephone Operators)

Early Telephone Operators and the Origin of “Hello Girls”

It was during this era that the nickname “Hello Girls” was born. Early switchboard operators typically greeted callers with a chipper “Hello, how may I connect your call?” Over time, people began referring to these young women as “Hello Girls,” known for their courtesy and calmness. The moniker stuck, following the women from the civilian telephone exchanges into their later military service.

Working conditions for these early operators could be demanding. Operating a manual switchboard required intense concentration and stamina. In busy urban exchanges, a single operator might complete several hundred calls per hour, constantly scanning for flashing line signals, plugging and unplugging cords, and keeping multiple conversations straight at once. It took months of training to master these skills. Yet the job was more than just connecting lines. In the early phone system, operators also gave personalized services. Hello Girls provided wake-up calls, time and weather information, and they could summon the police or a doctor in an emergency.

Despite relatively low pay, women were eager to work these jobs, earn their own income, and feel useful outside of the home. Telephone companies sought to attract educated, well-mannered women. They imposed strict hiring standards – operators had to be single (in many cases), of “good character,” and able to remain calm under pressure.

Answering the Call in World War I

With the invention of the telephone still relatively only a few decades old “it became an essential tool for communication between commanders and frontline soldiers in World War I” (The Hello Girls of World War I). So, when the United States entered the war in 1917, the Army soon found it faced a critical communications crisis. This modern war moved at a rapid pace, and telephone lines were the new nervous system relaying commands to the front. Staffed by poorly trained US soldiers and French women not fluent in English, this mix was doing more harm than good.

General John J. Pershing, head of the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF), found that poor phone communication was hampering operations on the Western Front and became increasingly frustrated. So, Pershing, having seen how American telephone companies were staffed overwhelmingly by women, made a radical request in November 1917: send American women to France to run the Army’s switchboards. In his cable to Washington, Pershing specified that all recruits must be bilingual in English and French.

Despite doubts by others in the army, Pershing got his way and soon “newspaper ads were sent out requesting American women telephone operators who spoke English and French to join the US Army Signal Corps.” (The Hello Girls of World War I) To mollify critics, it was stipulated that these women must be between 23-28 years of age and of high moral character. Recruitment began in late 1917. While Pershing only asked for 100 women, over 7,000 applied! 450 were accepted into training, but only 223 were ultimately chosen to be sent overseas to France.

The selectees underwent military training at Camp Franklin – part of Fort Meade in Maryland. They practiced Army drills, learned military protocols and terminology, were issued official US Army uniforms, took the US Army oath of allegiance, and were subject to all military rules (The Hello Girls of World War I). In effect, they were treated as soldiers during training and employment. In March 1918, just as the Germans launched a massive offensive on the Western Front, the first units of the US Army Signal Corps Female Telephone Operators deployed to Europe.

The American women who served in the Signal Corps were distributed among the First, Second, and Third Army headquarters and other key sites. Wherever the AEF went, the Hello Girls set up their switchboards. Many worked within range of artillery fire, often in hastily converted offices or tents near the front with gas masks nearby. They managed routing calls from commanders to frontline units, connecting American and French staff, and even transmitting orders for artillery barrages. Their workload was intense but even under bombardment or other emergencies, they stayed at their posts. In one dramatic incident, a fire broke out in a building housing the First Army switchboard. The Army had to forcefully evacuate the Hello Girls, who flatly refused to abandon their stations while calls were ongoing. Once the blaze was contained, the women went immediately back to work and restored communications within an hour.

The Hello Girls quickly proved indispensable to the US military effort. Telephone technology was one area in which the U.S. had an edge in 1918, and the Army wisely capitalized on the expertise of these female operators. Bilingual and highly skilled, General Pershing himself noted that the women were far more efficient at telephone work than any men available and even outperformed the veteran French operators in speed and accuracy. The Hello Girls’ call times were six times faster than that of the men who previously held their positions. Throughout World War I, they connected more than 26 million calls with an average speed of answering and connecting being a mere ten seconds! (The Hello Girls of World War I)

Unsung Heroes: A 60-Year Fight for Recognition

After the guns fell silent in 1918, the Hello Girls expected to come home and be treated as the soldiers they believed themselves to be. They had worn the US Army uniform, sworn the Army oath, held ranks, and been subject to Army regulations just like any soldier. Yet upon returning, these women encountered a bitter denial of their military status. The Army officially categorized the female operators as civilian contract employees, even though no actual contracts had ever been issued to them. In practical terms, this meant they received no honorable discharges, no Victory Medals, no veterans’ benefits, and no recognition for their service. When some of the women applied for the victory bonuses granted to US military personnel, the War Department rebuffed them, insisting the Hello Girls had never been in the Army at all. It was a crushing disappointment.

Hello Girl On Night Shift, San Francisco, 1929

The injustice was apparent to many even at the time. Prominent Army officers, including Signal Corps leadership, urged Congress to acknowledge the Hello Girls as veterans, but their pleas were repeatedly nixed by military bureaucracy. The Army’s lawyers stuck to the line that regulations had never been amended to allow these women “in” the Army, and thus they were never officially service members. This technicality overrode the reality of what the Hello Girls had done.

Starting in the 1920s, bills were introduced in Congress to remedy the situation. But entrenched opposition – including from the Veterans Bureau (precursor to the VA) and even groups like the American Legion – stymied the legislation every time. Over the next five decades, no fewer than 24 bills were brought forth to secure veteran status for the Hello Girls. All failed. Meanwhile, time passed, and the women grew older. Many passed away feeling their service was overlooked by the country they helped in its hour of need.

But a few tenacious survivors refused to give up the fight. One was Merle Egan Anderson, a former Hello Girl from Seattle, who almost single-handedly kept the issue alive into the 1970s. Anderson, widowed and in her 80s, wrote countless letters to officials and gathered support wherever she could. The persistence finally paid off. In 1977 – nearly 60 years after World War I ended – Congress granted the Hello Girls full military veteran status. President Jimmy Carter signed it into law in November 1977, officially affirming that the women were honorably discharged from the US Army and entitled to the same benefits as any other World War I veteran.

This victory came in time for just a small few. When the law passed, only 18 Hello Girls were still alive to receive their honorable discharge certificates. But those survivors expressed pride, not bitterness, at the belated recognition. Olive Shaw, for instance, used one of her newly won benefits to secure a burial in a national cemetery and in October 1980, she became the first woman laid to rest in Massachusetts National Cemetery: her gravestone identifying her as a World War I Army veteran. The others who had already died were also not forgotten; in recent years, the Department of Veterans Affairs has provided new headstones to ensure that the service of these trailblazing women is noted for posterity.

Legacy and Modern Remembrance

The story of the Hello Girls might have faded into a historical footnote were it not for their triumphs in both military and technological arenas. In the US military, these women paved the way for the greater integration of women that would slowly unfold over the 20th century.

Beyond the military, the Hello Girls demonstrated that women could excel in highly technical, meticulous work. Their multitasking prowess and cool efficiency under pressure challenged old Victorian notions that such work was “unsuitable” for the female temperament. In the decades after WWI, women continued to dominate telephone operator roles and by the mid-20th century, hundreds of thousands of women were employed as switchboard operators.

Today, the Hello Girls stand recognized as true American patriots. In 2024, though all the Hello Girls had passed away, they were awarded a Congressional Gold Medal through the signing of the Hello Girls Congressional Gold Medal Act of 2024 (S. 815 (118^th): Hello Girls Congressional Gold Medal Act of 2024). Their legacies were secured. They were the first American women to serve in the Army (albeit not officially enlisted at the time) and the first to prove that technological adeptness and battlefield bravery were not exclusive to men.

From the first “Hello, how can I help you?” spoken by Emma Nutt in 1878, to the final belated salute in 2024, the journey of the Hello Girls is a tale of service, sacrifice, and steadfast determination. Theirs is a story that reminds us how often in history women’s contributions go unheralded, and how satisfying it is when those contributions finally get the acknowledgment they deserve.

References:

“From bad boys to the hello girls – the origins of the Telephone Operator.” https://stephenliddell.co.uk/2021/03/22/from-bad-boys-to-the-hello-girls-the-origins-of-the-telephone-operator/

“The Hello Girls of World War I.” https://www.thecollector.com/hello-girls-world-war-i

“The Rise and Fall of Telephone Operators.” https://www.history.com/articles/rise-fall-telephone-switchboard-operators

Images: