11/19/2024
Did you know that November 1967 marks the first meeting between AT&T and the FCC to establish a universal number that was to be used in case of emergency? After the urging of the National Association of Fire Chiefs in 1957 and subsequent meeting, 10 years later, AT&T announced 9-1-1 as the emergency code for the United States. At the time, 9-1-1 was chosen due to the speed at which it could be dialed on a rotary phone and that it had never been used as an area code, service code or office code. The first 9-1-1 call was made in 1968 by Alabama Senator Rankin Fite to U.S. Representative Tom Bevill as a test. AT&T first implemented 9-1-1 in Huntington, Indiana on March 1, 1968. Although the roll-out took many years, by 1979, 26% of the US could dial the number. This increased to 50% by 1987 and to 93% by 2000. By March 2022, 98.9% of the US had access to 9-1-1. Today, 9-1-1 is the standard emergency number for the United States, Canada, Mexico, Philippines, Argentina, Panama, Palau, Uruguay, Dominican Republic, Saint Martin, Fiji, Jordan, Iraq and Pakistan. The idea of a national emergency telephone number originated in the United Kingdom in 1937, using the number 999, which is still in use today.
