National Telephone Company

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Company logo in porch of 17 & 19 Newhall Street, Birmingham (former Central exchange)

The National Telephone Company (NTC) was a British telephone company from 1881 until 1911 which brought together smaller local companies in the early years of the telephone. It was taken over by the General Post Office (GPO) in 1912.

Three years after the first telephone company, The Telephone Company (Bells Patents) Ltd., appeared in London (in fact it was the first in Europe), NTC was set up on 10 March 1881. It rapidly expanded by acquiring other British telephone companies. In 1886 it built an ornate red brick and terracotta building 19, Newhall Street, now grade I listed, for its Birmingham Central exchange, opened in 1887.

The Telegraph Acts of 1868 and 1869 allowed the Postmaster General to acquire telegraphic and then telephone companies for the GPO. In 1897 NTC was forced to sell its trunk lines to the GPO, and was finally taken over by them on 1 January 1912.