Name/Title
Egg House Telephone BuildingEntry/Object ID
1988.323.0175Description
One Man Telephone Co. #2 Walking Tour - Egg House Telephone Building
Picture and description of the 1940's one man phone Co. in Mesquite
Hubert A. Leavitt, strung telephone wire wrapped around empty fruit bottles as insulators in the tops of Mesquite Trees and fence posts between Bunkerville and Mesquite in 1907 thus beginning the use of telephones in Virgin Valley. By 1908, telephone service was extended to Beaver Dam, Arizona Territory. A Board of Directors was formed and the stockholders of Rio Virgin Telephone Company met on July 17, 1908 and approved Articles of Incorporation. The company proposed to build and maintain a line from Moapa, Nevada to St. George, Utah. The life of this incorporation was to extend for 50 years. The leadership of this company changed over the years until it came under the control of J. Lewis Pulsipher and Mitchell Burns. Then, James and Rita Pulsipher bought the Rio Virgin Telephone Company from J. Lewis Pulsipher in 1944. They moved the telephone office from the Pulsiphers’ house at the Pulsipher Ranch to what had been the Egg House where they installed a new 40-line switchboard. Before that time the company serviced only four telephones. The sheriff had one; the store had one; a garage had one. Everyone else went to the telephone office in the Pulsipher home to make or receive calls. The building became the first freestanding telephone office in Mesquite