Phoneton is an unincorporated community

Unincorporated area

In law, an unincorporated area is a region of land that is not a part of any municipality.To "incorporate" in this context means to form a municipal corporation, a city, town, or village with its own government. An unincorporated community is usually not subject to or taxed by a municipal government...

 in southwestern Bethel Township

Bethel Township, Miami County, Ohio

Bethel Township is one of the twelve townships of Miami County, Ohio, United States. The 2000 census found 4,927 people in the township.-Geography:Located in the southeastern corner of the county, it borders the following townships:...

, Miami County

Miami County, Ohio

As of the census of 2000, there were 98,868 people, 38,437 households, and 27,943 families residing in the county. The population density was 243 people per square mile . There were 40,554 housing units at an average density of 100 per square mile...

, Ohio

Ohio

Ohio is a Midwestern state in the United States. The 34th largest state by area in the U.S.,it is the 7th‑most populous with over 11.5 million residents, containing several major American cities and seven metropolitan areas with populations of 500,000 or more.The state's capital is Columbus...

, United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. It is part of the Dayton

Dayton, Ohio

Dayton is the 6th largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County, the fifth most populous county in the state. The population was 141,527 at the 2010 census. The Dayton Metropolitan Statistical Area had a population of 841,502 in the 2010 census...

 Metropolitan Statistical Area

Greater Dayton

The Dayton metropolitan area is the fourth largest metropolitan area in the state of Ohio, behind the largest, Greater Cincinnati, Greater Cleveland, and Greater Columbus.-Definitions:...

. At one time, it was the center of telephone

Telephone

The telephone , colloquially referred to as a phone, is a telecommunications device that transmits and receives sounds, usually the human voice. Telephones are a point-to-point communication system whose most basic function is to allow two people separated by large distances to talk to each other...

 communications in America. The AT&T Company (Bell System) placed a three-story brick building on the National Road

National Road

The National Road or Cumberland Road was the first major improved highway in the United States to be built by the federal government. Construction began heading west in 1811 at Cumberland, Maryland, on the Potomac River. It crossed the Allegheny Mountains and southwestern Pennsylvania, reaching...

 in Phoneton to house the switchboards

Telephone switchboard

A switchboard was a device used to connect a group of telephones manually to one another or to an outside connection, within and between telephone exchanges or private branch exchanges . The user was typically known as an operator...

 and operators

Telephone operator

A telephone operator is either* a person who provides assistance to a telephone caller, usually in the placing of operator assisted telephone calls such as calls from a pay phone, collect calls , calls which are billed to a credit card, station-to-station and person-to-person calls, and certain...

 to relay calls moving over its lines across the country. The town grew to supply the AT&T workers by providing housing, food and shopping for sundry items. A general store

General store

A general store, general merchandise store, or village shop is a rural or small town store that carries a general line of merchandise. It carries a broad selection of merchandise, sometimes in a small space, where people from the town and surrounding rural areas come to purchase all their general...

 existed until the 1960s and also housed the local post office, though the telephone switching ceased to operate early in the twentieth century due to automated call switching

Telephone exchange

In the field of telecommunications, a telephone exchange or telephone switch is a system of electronic components that connects telephone calls...

.