It hasn't been that long ago that a home phone was a part of the essential fiber of a home. As recently as fifteen years ago, back in 2007, a person couldn't imagine life without having a phone stationed in nearly every room of a home.

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Though most everyone had a mobile cell phone by that time, the home phone was still considered a necessity for most American families. Recent surveys indicate that now, only a little less than one third of American homes have a home phone and most of those with that home phone are households of persons 75 years of age or older.

Joe Raedle/Getty Images
Joe Raedle/Getty Images
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Technology has crept into nearly every aspect of our daily lives. Our cell phones have circumvented the need for so many other devices, that this one gadget has become a catch-all of sorts for so many things we once deemed necessary.

That phone has taken away the need for a calculator, a thesaurus, a typewriter, the need for pen and paper, paper calendars, it's even shut out the need for stand-alone cameras. For that matter, it's eliminated the need for paper maps and the age-old compass.

Rawf8, thinkstock
Rawf8, thinkstock
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One device has eliminated the need for so many others. But there are certain other items we once used daily, that we absolutely have no need for today.

Photo by scanrail
Photo by scanrail
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I mentioned this on my personal Facebook page and the responses I got were staggering to consider.

  • Mike wrote that he no longer uses a coffee percolator or an alarm clock. Yeah, the old alarm clock was yet another victim of that cell phone.
  • Eddie mentioned "the stove", but don't laugh.  Consider how few of your meals are prepared in/on the stove as compared to the microwave
  • Duke and Tiffany both mentioned "the phone book".  Don't need it.  We have Google.
  • Bobbiann wrote, "CD's" and she's right. That's what mp3's are for these days
  • Tammy mentioned "encyclopedias".  Another victim of the Google monster
  • Katie mentioned "a beeper." Chalk another one up for your cell phone.
  • Jeremy wrote about one of the few things not replaced by your cell phone or Google when he wrote "standard transmission."  Makes you wonder how many Generation Z kids would be totally stranded if a vehicle with a stick shift was there only means of transportation
  • Lana wrote "clotheslines" and that took me back to that fresh smell of laundry hanging out on a warm summer day. Good times.
  • Kane mentioned "ash trays" and that was a home run for me.  I don't remember the last ash tray I saw (not one of those outside a store, but a real glass ash tray)
  • Sheila mentioned a "dictionary" and my mind wandered to my youth and having to open up that 40 pound Webster's to find the meaning of any word I didn't understand
  • Lyn mentioned a "tea pot" and I could hear the distant whistle of my grandmother's pot in the depths of my memory
  • Karen threw in "rabbit ear antenna" and I chuckled to myself thinking of our old Zenith Chromacolor TV.  Rabbit ear on top and my little brother WAS the remote control for all 3 channels we had in Shreveport.
  • Woody and Ed mentioned the "transistor radio" and I fondly remembered it was that old radio that served as inspiration for what I would call my forever career when I was just a young man

Of course, the biggest response we got from so many was "common sense" and the sad part about its lack of use is that nothing has come along to replace it.  We just seem to have lost the need for it.

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