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Travel, History, and The Union Hotel in America's Dairyland |
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In an era when communication is reduced to
pushing out messages on handheld personal devices, it’s good to know one
thing remains entrenched defiantly in the past: The Union Hotel pay
phone booth.
By all measures the diminutive cherry-wood booth in the lobby of De Pere’s historic lodging and restaurant serves little purpose as cell phones, iPhones and Blackberrys become as common as sin.
AT&T dropped its pay phone service in 2007, forcing hotel owner McKim Boyd to find another provider. Boyd now pays $81 a month to keep the phone working, and he sees nary a penny from the quarters dropped into the slot. Not exactly a winning business plan, but Boyd, whose devotion to historic preservation runs as deep as his family’s roots at the popular establishment, never blinked.
“Nothing makes me happier than to have someone come back after forty, fifty years and say, 'This is just like the last time I was here,’” says Boyd, the fourth-generation owner with his sister Mary. Besides, he adds, “Without the phone it wouldn't be a phone booth - it would just be a booth. Maintaining the historical integrity of the hotel is very important to me.” It’s likely the longest-serving pay phone booth in the state. Installed in the 1930s, it contains the original mercury light switch, which is activated when you close the folding door, and a fan. Local calls are four bits. Michael Bie, 2009 |
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