Five people in a telephone booth Phonebooth stuffing is a sporadic

fad A fad, trend, or craze is any form of collective behavior that develops within a culture, a generation, or social group in which a group of people enthusiastically follow an impulse for a short time period. Fads are objects or behaviors tha ...

that involves a number of people consecutively entering a

telephone booth A telephone booth, telephone kiosk, telephone call box, telephone box or public call box is a tiny structure furnished with a payphone and designed for a telephone user's convenience; typically the user steps into the booth and closes the boot ...

until either the phonebooth can accommodate no more, or there are no more individuals available. Competition to beat prior records of numbers of people has been an aspect of the fad's popularity; however, that has decreased over the decades, in part because of the reduced prevalence of fully-enclosed booths.

Spread

The origins of the fad are unclear, but it was only one of several that had likely originated and become widespread in the post–

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

years. By early 1959, the fad had spread to

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, and the

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. On March 20, 1959, students at the

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YMCA YMCA, sometimes regionally called the Y, is a worldwide youth organisation based in Geneva, Switzerland, with more than 64 million beneficiaries in 120 countries. It has nearly 90,000 staff, some 920,000 volunteers and 12,000 branches w ...

set a world record when 25 of them were able to squeeze at least the greater portions of their bodies into a standard upright phonebooth. The participants ranged in height from . Very little unoccupied volume remained; when the phone rang, nobody inside had enough space free to pick up the handset and answer it.

Subsidence

Although it had been referred to as "one of the all-time great fads" by the ''

Bridgeport Post The ''Connecticut Post'' is a daily newspaper located in Bridgeport, Connecticut. It serves Fairfield County and the Lower Naugatuck Valley. Municipalities in the Post's circulation area include Ansonia, Bridgeport, Darien, Derby, Easton, ...

'', it had come to be regarded as passé by the end of 1959. It was akin in meteoric rise and fall to the earlier fads of flagpole sitting, goldfish swallowing, and panty raids, and to the later fad of

streaking Streaking is the act of running naked through a public area for publicity, for fun, as a prank, a dare, a form of protest, or to participate in a fad. Streaking is often associated with sporting events, but can occur in more secluded areas. Str ...

.badfads.com
"Telephone booth stuffing." Retrieved October 5, 2007 While still practiced contemporarily, it has not again achieved the social currency it had in the late

1950s File:1950s decade montage.png, 370x370px, Top, L-R: U.S. Marines engaged in street fighting during the Korean War, late September 1950; The first polio vaccine is developed by Jonas Salk.Centre, L-R: US tests its first thermonuclear bomb with co ...

References

{{reflist category:1950s fads and trends category:history of the telephone category:public phones

Spread

Subsidence

See also

References