Strangest thing I remmember. One store had a full 1a2 style phone system with rotary phones and dial intercom, Automatic Electric if I remember correctly, yet none of the lines connected to the phone company! The owner had some kind of dispute with ma bell and would not install their equipment, instead two phone lines went directly into the office where the two phone systems met. Accoustic couplers allowed the handset of the phone to communicate with the phone system. Anyone could call any extension, but dialing 98 0r 99 connected you to the office, where you could tell the secretary who you wanted to call. She dialed the number then set the phone down. If you finished a buzzer rang and the secretary hung up. What a wierd system! Odder still it was working that way in 1986! Never got to see the switching equipment used. A few years later the place was bulldozed for an expressway exit. I remember how fully the desk phones looked!
