TELLS OF OPPORTUNITIES IN THE BELL SYSTEM

About 30 members of the University attended the talk on the "Non-Technical Opportunities in the Bell System for Harvard Men" by Mr. D. S. Bridgman of the American Telephone and Telegraph Company in Harvard 1 last night. Mr. Bridgman dealt mainly with the work in the three departments of the System that are open to non-technical men. These, according to Mr. Bridgman, are the traffic, commercial and field departments.

Duties of the Departments

He said that it was the duty of the traffic department to keep the service maintained with the utmost efficiency, especially during rush hours, and that the commercial department had for its duties the maintenance of the good will of the public as well as the selling of the service. "The field department," continued Mr. Bridgman, "surveys the types of service now being used, and prophesies what they will be 20 years hence so that when that time comes, the branch offices and viaducts for the cable transmission will not have been badly misplaced."

Mr. Bridgman also described the Western Electric plant in Chicago, a subsidiary of the Bell system, which employs 30,000 people and covers 200 acres of ground. "This company turns out $150,000,000 worth of apparatus each year," said Mr. Bridgman.

"The telephone company is no place for a man who is looking forward to a meteoric rice in his position or for a man who looks forward to making a million dollars," cautioned Mr. Bridgman. But the telephone company has many advantages which a small concern has not, for instance a larger chance to advance into varied fields, the contact with big men, and the develop- ment obtained as a result of such contacts.

"As regards the financial side of telephone work for a man who has just obtained his A.B. degree, the first month's wages are usually at the rate of about $27 a week.

At the end of his talk Mr. Bridgman announced that he and representatives from the New York Telephone Company and also the New England Telephone and Telegraph Company would be in Peabody Hall of Phillips Brooks House today and tomorrow from 10 to 5 o'clock to hold interviews with all men interested