Hi! Firstly, I realise this is an incredibly niche area but I am a graphic design student working on collateral/stationary for a fictional hotel from the 1950s located in Bath. I am wondering how phone numbers worked in the 1950s, particularly one in Bath?
Also, did people write addresses in the same way as we write them these days? I'm reading that postal codes came in towards the very end of the 50s. Are there any other conventions that I might not be familiar with?
Thank you!
TLDR: What would be an example of a 1950s phone number from Bath, UK?
No subscriber trunk dialing or post codes in the 1950s, and a city the size of Bath would have only needed a single telephone exchange and four-digit phone numbers. So the stationery would merely read "Marlborough Hotel, 152 Royal Crescent, Bath. Telephone 4490. Telegrams: Marlborough Hotel, Bath." If you were in London, you'd have the operator connect you with "Bath 4490." Adverts of the era nearly always listed the hotel's manager or owner—"C.M. Lovering, Proprietor"—but I don't know that stationery would have done.
If you're in the UK, the easiest way to look at contemporary usages like this is in the adverts found in old magazines or the Sunday Times travel section from the proper era. Sometimes you get lucky and can see such things on Google Books, but for material from the 1950s it's too often merely snippet view. Another good resource is the ephemera sold on eBay.uk.