Australian Post Office
Telephone 332

This telephone, introduced into Australia in 1939, was manufactured in the U.K. by the Telephone Manufacturing Company and Ericsson Telephones Ltd. Large quantities of these (black) telephones were imported to cope with the ever increasing demand for these telephones in Australia. A sliding drawer in the base provided for notepaper which allowed frequently called numbers to be recorded. Because of sticking drawers and subsequent breakages, later orders placed by the APO PMG with the U.K. manufacturers requested that the drawers not be fitted, and hence dummy plates were substituted in their place. Limited purchases of red, green and ivory telephones were made by the PMG Department prior to World War 2, but no purchases of the red and green phones were made after the war, as the fading problem encountered with earlier coloured telephones remained unsolved.