The ‘Lady’ Telephone Operator: Gendering Whiteness in the Bell System, 1900–70

Abstract

Written some eighty years after the Bell System began constructing its image of the ideal telephone woman, this letter illustrates how greater societal notions of white womanhood are absorbed and transformed to ‘gender’ whiteness in the workplace. The ‘woman’ referred to is vulnerable and needs protection. Her genteel feminine nature would be insulted by ‘profanity’ given her high moral character. This woman’s identity is shaped by defining African Americans as ‘others’. By this definition white women possess innate qualities that black women do not and cannot obtain.

Dear Mr. Morgan

The question of a female’s qualification to be a Commercial Representative has arisen due to a vacancy in Charlotte. I strongly urge that we not consider a female for this job.One of the Commercial Representative’s main functions is to make visits to customers’ premises to solve difficult problems. Most of these visits are under unfavorable, defensive, or argumentative circumstances and usually to areas such as slums and negro ghettos. To send a woman to such localities would be an open invitation to assault, rape, or death, in addition to profanity and other verbal abuse.¹