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Show Operator Who Leaves After Long Service MRS. MAMIE FUGATE. EIDS IK CAREER IPIfiE SERVICE Mrs. Mamie Fug-ale to Leave Soon for Los Angeles to Live.' After an experience unusual in tho telephone business, Mrs, Mamie Fugate, local chiet' operator Tor the Mountain States Telephone & Telegraph company at Salt Lake City, leaves the employ of the company tomorrow and will leave May 1 for Los Angeles, where she will make her home with her son, J. L. Fuga,te, who is connected with tho E. G. Hutchinson Electric company there, Mrs. Fugate, then Miss Mamie Kirk-ham, Kirk-ham, entered tho telephone business here in 1886. At that time tho Rocky Mountain Bell Telephone company, her omplo3rer, was only throe years old and tho switchboard in use was the first switchboard ever used in Salt Lako City, D. S. Murray, afterward and for many years general manager of the Jlocky -Mountain Boll company, was then local manager at Salt Lake City. Mrs. Fugate was a locul operator for a few month's after she entered the business, but was made chief operator within a year. Sho remained "with tho company tintil May J, 18D0, when she resigned to bo married. She re-entered tho service October 1, 1901, after her husband's death, and was assistant chief operator until May 16, 1906, when sho again becamo .chief oporator, the position she has held ever since. , Mrs. Fugate has worked on ever' switchboard the Bell company has op-orated op-orated in Salt Lake. When 'she came to work the switchboard, which is still preserved as a relic by the company, was less than ton feet long and the operating op-erating force consisted of eight girls. She has jurisdiction now over about 200 feet of switchboard and tho opor ating force has 225 membors. The list of 300 subscribers who had service when she took charge in 18S6 has grown to mjoro than 16,000 and the three rooms in tho Dcsorcf. National bank building, which constituted the com-pan.y's com-pan.y's quarters then, have given way to a five-story building on State stree't and a new, three-story building on Eighth East street is about to be occupied. oc-cupied. In her long residence n.t Salt Lake Cit3 whore, by reason of h6r occupation occupa-tion she has formed au unusvally large acquaintance, Mrs. Fugate ha inado a host of friends who view lur doparturc with siucero rotrret and wi.h her the crrontest uossiblo happiness in hor new home. Her relations -with other employees em-ployees of the company, throughout the years in which she was actively connected con-nected with it, have always been 'of the most pleasant nature and her departuro will be felt more keenly among the telephone tel-ephone people than anywhere else. |