pay phone story

Payphone Story – Global History of Payphones and Phone Booths

US Payphone- Sesa-ITT Alcatel

This American version of SESA’s Spanish TRM-100 was sold around 1987–90 by Payphone Inc. of Clemmons, North Carolina, as the “Payphone of America.” Accepting US nickel, dime and quarter coins, it served the expanding private-payphone market. Its branding captures SESA’s corporate transition from ITT ownership into Alcatel during this period.

Name	SESA–ITT “Payphone of America” – American version of the TRM‑100, c.1987–90
Date	late 1980s. Used in supervised locations.
Manufacturer	Sesa-ITT Alcatel Standard Eléctrica S.A. (SESA), Spain
Link	Also used in Spain Link to marketing PDF file

Development of the SESA–ITT “Payphone of America”

SESA–ITT “Payphone of America” – American version of the TRM‑100, c.1987–90
Manufacturer: Standard Eléctrica S.A. (SESA), Spain
Parent company: ITT; subsequently incorporated into Alcatel
Distributor: Payphone Inc./Payphone of America, Clemmons, North Carolina

A 1989 US trade directory gives Payphone of America, operated by Payphone Inc., at P.O. Box 709, Clemmons, North Carolina, with B. G. Hauser as the contact. This places the telephone within the late-1980s American private-payphone market rather than the Bell System’s public network.

SESA, ITT and Alcatel

The corporate history explains why it looks like an Alcatel:
Standard Eléctrica S.A., or SESA, was ITT’s principal Spanish telecommunications manufacturing company.
SESA produced equipment for Telefónica, including the TRM‑100 payphone.
During 1986–87, ITT’s European telecommunications businesses, including Standard Eléctrica, were transferred into the new Alcatel organisation.
Standard Eléctrica subsequently became Alcatel Standard Eléctrica.
ITT stood for International Telephone and Telegraph Corporation. It was a large American multinational founded in 1920 by brothers Sosthenes and Hernand Behn.

Despite its American base, ITT built an enormous international telecommunications empire by acquiring manufacturers and telephone companies around the world. Its companies included:
-Standard Eléctrica (SESA) in Spain
-Standard Telephones and Cables (STC) in Britain and Australia
-Standard Elektrik Lorenz (SEL) in Germany
-Bell Telephone Manufacturing Company in Belgium
-Standard Telephones and Radio in various other countries

These businesses frequently shared ITT technology, although they also developed equipment for their respective national markets.
In Spain, ITT established Standard Eléctrica S.A. in 1926. SESA became a major supplier to the Spanish telephone administration, CTNE—later Telefónica—and manufactured exchanges, ordinary telephones and public payphones such as the TRM series.

During the 1960s and 1970s, ITT expanded beyond telecommunications into hotels, insurance, automotive components and numerous other industries. It consequently became one of the world’s largest and most controversial conglomerates.

In 1986–87, ITT sold most of its European telecommunications manufacturing operations to the French company Compagnie Générale d’Électricité, whose telecommunications business became Alcatel. SESA therefore changed from Standard Eléctrica–ITT to Alcatel Standard Eléctrica.

Payphone’s corporate lineage is:

SESA → ITT → Alcatel
It was manufactured during the transitional ITT/Alcatel period, but its labels identify it specifically as a Standard Eléctrica–ITT product.