Edmonds History: The Yost Family Creates the Independent Phone Company

It was 1908, and Edmonds was not happy with its phone service.

Telephones first came to Edmonds in 1900 when the strung lines through the trees to Edmonds. They set up the switchboard in the home of , whose daughter Ruth became the first operator. The switchboard later moved to the old Edmonds Post Office at Second and Bell (see Patch article, “”).

While Sunset's service was a tremendous innovation in 1900, by the second decade of the century it did not meet the rapdily evolving telephone industry standards. Great strides had been made in telephone technology and service, and many cities and towns boasted new equipment, complex switchboards, and 24-hour service.

Edmonds was enjoying boom economic times, population was mushrooming, and civic pride demanded that the growing city keep up with the latest innovations. This resulted in a growing sentiment for a phone company that could provide a higher level of service.

The indomitable Yost family jumped into the breach, and in 1908 Allan Yost and his son Dan took the first steps to organize a local phone company. The Yosts were already active in the lumbering, sawmill, shingle, water supply, automotive and bus transportation businesses, and phone service seemed a logical extension. A hastily recruited board of directors comprised mainly of local merchants and business owners elected Allan Yost president of the new Independent Telephone Company. Dan Yost was subsequently elected manager, a post he held until 1943.

Once the company was organized and capital raised, work began on stringing wires, organizing a central switchboard, and connecting customers to the new system. Dan Yost hired Ruth Nelson as operator (not to be confused with Sunset Telephone’s Ruth Hyner), who slept in the back room of the company’s office. At first the Independent Phone Company offered daily phone service to Edmonds from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. In 1912, service was expanded to 24 hours.

Independent Phone continued to operate as a locally owned utility until 1943, when it was acquired by Telephone Service Company, which in turn was bought out in 1950 by West Coast Telephone. Ruth Nelson stayed with the company until 1952, when the local switchboards were disconnected and replaced with automated equipment that did away with the operator who asked, “Number, please?”

Independent's former Main Street office is occupied today by the , where owner Joan Archer provides a setting for artists to create and display their work onsite.