DIY
TELEPHONY
THE DISEMBODIED VOICE OF
JUDY GARLAND SPEAKS!
How to make a Ghost Phone.
By Greg MacLaurin
Currently, I’m obsessed with analog telephones.
Photography by Greg MacLaurin
I don’t know why. My last obsession was with the
severed hands of mummies, but let’s not get into
that. Today it’s phones. And these Ghost Phones are
fun. The idea is simple: hide an MP3 player and its
headphone inside an old analog telephone, and you
can listen to someone talking to you!
1. Record audio and load
But before we start unscrewing things willy-nilly, the MP3 player.
let’s take a moment to find out about analog phones 1a. Decide which ghost you want to summon. Think
and how they work. (I hate reinventing the wheel. of who the ghost is, and who they’re talking to. Set
I’m all into research.)
Privateline.com has a good a scene. All my Ghost Phones are first-person: the
history of telephone technology, and HowStuff- ghost totally monopolizes the conversation, and
Works has a technical overview at howstuffworks. never lets you get a word in edgewise. Even though
com/ telephone.htm. Remember, these are just the ghost might ask a question, they either answer
starting points. Please do your own research; you’ll it for you or they just continue talking.
learn something amazing in the process.
Now that you’ve become a font of information
on analog telephones, you’re ready to modify one.
Here are my instructions for making a Judy Garland
Ghost Phone.
Make: 151
