The Telephone

Santa Cruz de Tenerife · Category: Memory · Subcategory: Historic sites · Year: 1892

The first telephone installation in Santa Cruz was established by Ennrique Wolfson in 1892 to connect his La Cuesta estate with his private house on Calle del Castillo. It was not the first on the island, as it is known that since 1885 the Ascanio family had connected two estates they owned in La Orotava by telephone.

In 1894 the "Sociedad de Teléfonos de Santa Cruz de Tenerife" (Santa Cruz de Tenerife Telephone Company) was formed, which began installing the urban network on 11 February 1895, inaugurated on 2 June of the same year. Initially it had 150 subscribers; in the following months the demand for having a telephone line in the city progressively increased. 

The first interurban line was established on 4 November 1895, connecting Santa Cruz with the "El Porvenir" casino in La Laguna. It was the first step towards achieving an island-wide network. The lack of a joint plan, administrative obstacles and the arrival of the First World War were factors that slowed its development. From 1914, the Cabildo commissioned the project of a network for the whole island, which was not materialised until 1922. Finally, in 1926 the Compañía Telefónica Nacional de España (National Telephone Company of Spain), created two years earlier, took over the entire network and unified the service. Its central headquarters in Santa Cruz was installed in a building on Teobaldo Power Street, opposite what is now the Parliament of the Canary Islands.

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