The Bell System Memorial site, along with
http://www.telephonetribute.com/

has some great information. Highly recommended, but be warned you'll end up reading them for the rest of the day instead of getting any work done! [Linked Image]

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Just read there that Graybar was a spin off of WE electrical supply department.

I found a couple of files a while ago which are taken from a satellite radio technical talk show of a few years ago, and in one of the telephone-related discussions the subject of Graybar came up.

The old-time switchman said that at one time Graybar was the only source of Western Electric telephone equipment for the independent (non-Bell) companies.

There's actually a lot of interesting nostaligic telephone and radio/TV talk on those links. Go to
http://www.centralofficeonline.com/

and you'll find two separate links about halfway down the page (the Tom & Daryll show).

Make sure you have plenty of time though -- Each clip is about an hour and a half!