About Us
Ironton Telephone Celebrates over 105 Years in the Lehigh Valley – From the first telephone pole and open wire to the latest broadband technology, Ironton Telephone’s focus has remained the same: affordable, dependable service for its customers, a stable work environment for its employees and on-going support for the community. It has been a recipe for success especially when you consider the fact that Ironton Telephone has been through the Great Depression, two world wars and over ten recessions and has remained intact and in the George family. To put their longevity in perspective, consider the fact that Ironton Telephone predates traffic signals, penicillin, stainless steel, talking motion pictures and television. Not only have they survived; they remain on the cutting edge, offering the latest technologies and service to their customers.
William "Butch" George was a man ahead of his time. Having heard rumors about a pending rate hike on his telephone bill, George invested in a small, fledgling telephone company as a way to save money on the phone calls from his butcher shop to the markets he supplied.
What started out in 1909 with just six miles of open wire and six customers, has evolved and grown to be a heritage company, celebrating over 105 years of serving the Lehigh Valley with over 90,000 lines served. Speak to a George family member about this landmark anniversary and you immediately get a sense of the gratitude they have for their customers, employees, neighbors, partners and communities. “Our goal has always been to maintain the highest service excellence to our customers whether they were served by the old ‘crank’ phones to the modern VOIP phones of today, and we are grateful to be here to have served both, “says William, “Bill” George II, grandson of Butcher George and today’s company President and CEO.
In addition to being an area leader in Telecommunications by serving their customers with dependable phone and DSL service, as well as telephone communication systems, Ironton Telephone continues to be an active community supporter. Ironton supports many scholastic and community events, the local arts, as well as numerous local and national charities. “We believe strongly in supporting the communities that we serve and reside in,” says Bill George, General Manager and third generation family member involved in the business.
William George, who became President in 1995, has spearheaded much of the company’s progress. Four of his brothers and sisters are involved. Allen M. M. George Jr. serves as Corporate Vice President of Operations; Patricia L. Stewart is Secretary/Treasurer and Director of Finance. Carolyn George and Rose Marie Beck are Customer Service Representatives. Four other siblings are not involved in the operation of the business. “Since each of us works in a separate part of the business, we seldom collide. The ultimate decisions come to me,” George says.
For more information about Ironton Telephone and their services, please visit www.ironton.com or call (610) 799-3131.
“Ironton Telephone Company is a family owned local telephone company who values the ideals of service providers from an era that seems long gone. These core values and our long term commitment to the mutual relationship we share with every customer provide them an experienced team dedicated to quality communications and customer service excellence.”
Bill George
– General Manager, Ironton Telephone Company
About Ironton Telephone
Ironton Telephone Company (ITC) was founded in 1909 by a group of businessmen from the area of Ballietsville. In 1927, partner William George who also operated a farm, butchery and several grocery stores purchased the company that was located in the Allentown and Bethlehem areas. Because of these prime locations, communications with businesses in the Lehigh Valley were essential, so a telephone company would ensure that the calls remained local.
In 1954, ITC was incorporated and received its Certificate of Public Convenience by current President and CEO William D. George II. In Lehigh Valley, ITC was the first to have tone dialing (touch-tone) and an analog electric switching system (TRW Vidar). ITC went digital by replacing its TRW Vidar switch with the current digital Nortel DMS-100/200 switch in 1995. Later, ITC added the Nortel (Genband) CS2K Softswitch platform for enhanced VOIP telecommunications services.
ITC partnered with Service Electric Cable TV (the cable TV pioneer in the US) to form Service Electric Telephone, a Competitive Local Access Provider, after the Telecommunications Act of 1996.
Today, ITC continues to be on the forefront of technology by deploying state-of-the-art emerging technologies like Voice over IP (VoIP) into its core network. ITC serves its expanding customers using their Nortel DMS-100/200 switch, 3 full-sized Nortel SONET remote switches, 6 Hybrid Fiber Coax head-end systems, 54 Nortel Access Nodes, 74 Digital Fiber Nodes and thousands of miles of fiber throughout the Greater Lehigh Valley, Eastern Pennsylvania, and Northwestern New Jersey. In March of 2012, ITC deployed the robust PortaSwitch as a second softswitch platform to deliver additional C5 hosted IP PBX / IP Centrex functionality and the ultimate feature set for prepaid calling card and VoIP wholesale carrier services. The entire PortaSwitch core is built around a comprehensive converged billing software platform utilizing Oracle Enterprise Oracle Real Application Clusters (RAC) and media application servers. With this combined legacy TDM and enhanced VoIP softswitching platforms, ITC can offer businesses of all sizes and industry partners the most dependable and cost effective communication services on the planet.
ITC delivers the following services to residential and business customers.
- Local and long distance telephone services
- ISDN – PRI and BRI services
- DSL, T1, T3, Bonded T1, Metro E and MPLS Internet service
- T1, DS-3, OC-3, OC-12, Ethernet networking services
- Voice applications services: voice mail, interactive voice response (IVR) services
- Digital Key Telephone Systems
- Enterprise PBX Communications Systems
- Enhanced suite of hosted IP PBX and SIP trunking services
- Domestic and International audio conferencing applications and services
- IP faxing services
At PenTeleData, our fully redundant fiber optic network with Intelligent Routing has more than 60 Points of Presence throughout Pennsylvania and New Jersey delivering Voice, Video, Data and Internet Services. One of our greatest assets is being LOCALLY owned – it allows us to remain proactive to our customer service demands, make decisions faster and ultimately support our customers better. We don’t outsource our customer support and since we own Pennsylvania’s largest privately owned fiber optic network, it provides us the luxury of deploying the most reliable, scalable fiber based solution in PA. Another advantage? Privately owned means just that – our network is built with private funds and not a single dollar of taxpayer money or outside venture capital.
PenTeleData is a Strategic Partnership of Local Cable and Telephone Companies, including Service Electric Cable TV and Communications, Service Electric Broadband Cable, Service Electric CableVision, CATV Service, Inc., Ironton Telephone Company and Blue Ridge Communications.
With a network as dependable as ours, the PenTeleData partners also offer the latest in enhanced interactive digital television services and telecommunications services. They work to stay ahead of the technology curve and keep our customers ahead of the competition with services that include:
- Digital Video Recording
- Video on Demand
- Digital and HD TV
- Digital Telephone
- Security Systems
- Residential Broadband Internet
- Commercial Wideband Internet
- Local Origination Channels, featuring news, weather and sports
Employment
This institution is an equal opportunity provider and employer.
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