Old Connecticut Telephone Book Sells for $170,500 at Auction

HARTFORD, CT (AP) -- An 1878 New Haven telephone book that was one of the first directories in the country has been sold for $170,500 at Christie's auction house in New York.

Auctioneers had expected the phone book to fetch between $30,000 and $40,000, but the price skyrocketed in a battle among six collectors. An identified U.S. collector submitted the top offer Tuesday.

The dingy white New Haven directory is no thicker than a junk mail flyer and lists 400 merchants, lawyers, doctors and others who subscribed to the phone service in 1878.

Christie's auctioneer Tom Lecky says the bidding war came after new details about the book emerged. He says additional research showed that an earlier Chicago directory is a reproduction and an earlier San Francisco book is less comprehensive than New Haven's.

Connecticut District Telephone Co. published the New Haven directory, just two years after the telephone was invented.