Nunn Telephone Company History
Over Seventy Years of Telecommunications Service
Like many rural telephone companies, Nunn Telephone Company’s history dates back to the early 20th century. The minutes of the Nunn Town Board meeting on June 20, 1911 state, S.E. Hobart was granted a franchise to build a telephone system.
Back in the early days of Nunn Telephone Company, some of the biggest challenges were building a system that would support reliable telecommunications. Groups of residents were responsible for maintaining their own rural lines. Gaining long-term financing to rebuild a system was very difficult, if not impossible, to attain.
Until the Rural Electrification Program (REA) became a reality and the agency branched out to include telephone services in the late 1940’s, rural telephone companies made due with what resources they had available.
Important Milestones
1948
Nunn Telephone Company purchased the telephone system from Frank Mann, who operated the existing cord-board from the front of his residence at 287 Logan Avenue in Nunn, Colorado. The magneto (hand crank phone) system was connected by open wire on four main lines serving the rural area. At that time the system served approximately 80 customers.
1959
The Company converted the original cooperative organization into a stock company. Today the company has 7,730 outstanding shares of stock held by 92 stockholders.
1965
The Company applied for an REA loan to upgrade the system to dial with mechanical step, switching in a newly constructed central office building and began trenching buried copper cables.
1972
Carr Telephone Exchange, owned by Mountain Bell, was purchased and added to Nunn Telephone Company.
2001
Fiber cable was placed to connect to Qwest in Pierce to add the data links to provide database services including Caller ID.
2003
DSL (Digital Subscriber Line) / (Data over Copper Lines) service was deployed.
2006
Fiber Optic Protected Ring was completed, connecting remote rural electronic cabinets to enable DSL service in the rural service area of Nunn Telephone Company.
2008
DSL build-out provided service to the entire serving area.
2009
Fifty miles of FTTH was constructed in the southwest corner of the serving area.
2010
Fifty miles of FTTH was constructed on the western edge of the serving area. Nunn Telephone Company receives $5.2 million in stimulus funding to complete the FTTH construction.
2011
Nunn Telephone Company connects to Denver in partnership with ten other rural telephone companies on a 720 mile protected fiber ring.
2012
FTTH constructed by the stimulus project begins. Over 220 miles of mainline fiber was constructed.
2013
FTTH construction is substantially complete. Customers subscribing to bundled services receive 6Mb, 15Mb, or 50Mb download services.
2016
DSL service was decommissioned due to an all fiber plant.
2018
IPv6 Internet Addresses service capability added to expand the nearly depleted IPv4 IP address pool allowing access to new content on IPv6 websites and unlimited IP address to enable IOT (Internet of Things.)
2019
Gigabit service was announced in January of 2019. Consumer Broadband Only Line) (CBOL) (Internet Only – No phone required) service began in December 2019.
