How To Install a Retro Phone

When my children were young, they discovered their grandmother’s telephone. They, of course, had seen a telephone before (we had a few in our own home), but this one was different because it had a rotary dial  and hung on the wall. They loved dialing the numbers! (They were pretty cute.)

Remember these?

My son’s amazement must have impressed my mother-in-law because when she updated and put in a push-button telephone, she wrapped up the dial-up and gave it to Max as a kind of gift. Well, he loved it but didn’t know what to do with it, so it sat in a box in his closet for a few years.

Last spring, I did what any good mother would do. I confiscated it. (With permission, of course.) I had the perfect spot–my basement laundry/sewing room. It had a phone jack a few inches from the floor–good, but not right for the big wall-mounted phone. My idea was to relocate the jack to a higher, appropriate level and put Max’s gift to use.

Where the old jack was...

I immediately went to Google. (Have I mentioned how much I love Google?) I found lots of help, but one site stood out:   Danny Lipford. This site offers an amazing amount of information on all

Where I wanted the jack to be...Use your imagination.

kinds of home improvement topics.  Check out his information if you are interested in doing this project.

It really was an easy project that cost less than $5. All I had to buy was the jack with a face plate made for wall phones. I purchased extra wire but did not need it.

The only thing I really had to purchase.

Before beginning, I took another telephone off the hook. I had read that, though there is not much current in a phone line, there is some current, and that if a call came in while I was touching a wire, I could get shocked. True or not, why risk it?

First, I removed the screws that held the current jack in place. When I pulled it out, I could see that the wire came from above. Yes! I loosened the 4 screws that held the four colored (green, black, red, yellow) wires from the phone line in place.

This is what I found behind the old jack cover plate. I could not get the box out because it was (and is) nailed sideways into the stud. There will have to be some creative drywall patching here later.

Next, I cut out a small square of drywall where I wanted to hang the wall phone. The hole was only about 2 x 2 inches. I just needed enough room to reach in and pull up on the wire. With a little gentle coaxing, and only one bad word (!), the line came right up.

Found the wire! It was about four feet directly above the old jack.

New location with successfully-fished wire coming out of my not-so-neatly cut hole. (This will be behind the telephone!)

Yea! Ready for the fun stuff.

The new phone jack/mounting plate had two parts. The part that fastened to the wall and held the wires that made the connection and the face plate that basically held the wall phone to the wall. I followed the directions on the mounting plate, first separating the two parts; then, I fed the four colored wires through holes and prepared to attach them to their corresponding screws. Everything was color-coded. Easy as could be.

New mounting plate--before wire from the wall is connected.

The wire from the wall has been fed through some holes in the plate. (The wire from the wall is really four wires, bound together.) Match the colors, and you will be fine!

Wire from the wall. See the four colored wires inside the wrapping?

One tip from Danny Lipford (home improvement guru) was to (after gently bending a small hook into the bare wire) hook the wire so that the wire hooks around the screw in a clockwise direction. That way, when you turn the screw (righty tighty) to secure the wire, it doesn’t fight to come off of the screw.

I used wall anchors to secure the back plate of the jack to the drywall. This telephone will not get a lot of use, but it is pretty heavy, and I did not want it to pull the screws out of the wall. Next, I reattached the face plate (according to the package directions.)

Finally, I plugged the phone into the jack, being sure the screw on the face plate fit securely to the grooves on the back of the phone.

Project complete! (Except for that little drywall patch that still needs to be completed to cover the old jack and exploratory hole.)

And yes. I then used my cell phone to call my home. The phone worked! It might not be the prettiest color (red would have been perfect), but it is definitely the coolest phone in the house–as long as you do not need to call someone quickly.

I miss my caller ID. Not that I would ever screen my calls, mind you...

Next, I need to pretty up the wall around the phone. That’s some fun for another day!