BELL ATLANTIC, Woodside

by Kevin Walsh

A sticker indicating the Verizon phone company has sufficiently peeled away on the mezzanine of the LIRR/#7 train complex in Woodside to permit view of its predecessor, Bell Atlantic, a company formed in 1984 after the Bell monopoly was sundered by the federal government and fractured into several different companies.

The Bell Telephone Company was formed in 1877 and named for the first patentee of the telephone, Alexander Graham Bell.

When Bell Atlantic merged with GTE in 2000, it adopted the moniker Verizon, a portmanteau of the Latin “Veritas” (“Truth”) and horizon.

5/6/15

3 comments

Adrian Gomez May 6, 2015 - 11:32 am

In 1984 AT&T(Ma Bell) was broken up into 7 regional companies to provide local telephone service. In New York and New England states the company was called NYNEX for New York New England and the X for the unknown. The mid Atlantic states were joined to form Bell Atlantic. Later on Bell Atlantic and NYNEX merged to form Bell Atlantic with their headquarters remaining in New York

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Ed Findlay May 6, 2015 - 11:40 am

This is rarer than you think, Bell Atlantic in New York was only around in the area for THREE years! Just 1997-2000 when Verizon came into being.

Prior to 1997 NYNEX was the local phone provider for New England and New York and between the Bell breakup in 1984 and the in-house merger in 1994 New Yorkers had New York Telephone…

Reply
John May 9, 2015 - 7:37 am

And if Antonio Meucci had some backers it would have been Meucci Telephone. His friendship with Garibaldi did not help in Washington. I don’t know if he had any contact with Marconi who was successful in getting patents. You have posted photos of their home/museum on Staten Island.

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