The "White Pages" of a telephone directory lists businesses and residences alphabetically, based on who is a registered telephone subscriber in a geographical area. Selected occupations are sometimes listed, for example: Doctor, Lawyer, Real Estate, Insurance Agent, etc.
Usually printed on white paper, White Pages in city directories or phone books let you look up people with the same last name that may meet your criteria – single, married, occupation, etc. and also list the names of other family members residing in the household. For example, you know that in 1980 an “Unknown” Smith was a college student living at home with her parents in Phoenix, that her father was a lawyer, and her mother was an accountant. Your search criteria would pull up all “Smiths” in the 1981 Phoenix Directory. From here, you may identify the right family, and acquire the first names of the college student and her parents, enabling you to locate them currently. If your search subject has a common first and last name, the White Pages can provide a middle initial and help narrow down your list of relevant people.
Yellow pages include business directories classified by business type or services provided, relying on paid advertisements to be listed in the phone book. Other colors in the phone book have other meanings: blue pages list infromation on government agencies in many areas.
Modern day Historians know that there is a wealth of information found in old White Pages within local Phone Books to find clues and links to persons and places of the past. Accessing the information in these directories used to involve trips or letters to the libraries, but now SpyralSearch has made it possible to do research in your own home or office by having the directory information on CD and DVD.
With a city directory and white pages in print form, you usually need the correct spelling of a person or business to look up the address and telephone number.
Reverse Telephone & Address Indexes are not always present in old phone books. However, with the White Page listings provided on CD from SpyralSearch, you may use the Adobe® Reader® search tool to find any individual, even by their first name, living on a certain street, or with the same telephone number, etc. Typing in just a few letters of the person you're searching for (or the telephone number) brings up a variety of possible matches. Start your search with SpyralSearch.
