…grow up to be–er, I mean, suck on telephone cords.

As a public service announcement, we bring you this reminder, which originally appeared in Popular Science a hundred years ago this month, May 1918.

There was apparently at that time a veritable epidemic of babies sucking on phone cords. According to the magazine, a woman called the complaint office of the phone company to report a malfunction in her instrument.  The phone company employee, who had apparently heard it all, immediately suggested that the customer check the cord of her phone to see if there was a dark and wet spot.

The customer confirmed that it was wet, and indignintaly replied, “baby was playing with the cord this morning and took it in her mouth, sucking at it for a while. Surely there can be no harm and that.”

The complaint clerk, according to the magazine, “had heard the same story many times,” callously told the woman to have the baby knock it off.

Insulation quality is probably better these days. But still, you shouldn’t let your baby suck on any kind of electrical cord. And if someone suggests otherwise, please don’t indignantly tell them that there’s nothing wrong with it.