44m PHONE BOOKS NEVER OPENED; We would rather use them as doorstops.

Byline: By Paula Murray

A NATIONAL institution is dying out as figures reveal 44million phone books a year are never even opened.

Up to two thirds of the 70million a year which are delivered free to UK homes and offices are left untouched - or put to other uses entirely.

They are often used as doorsteps or wedges to prop up wonky table legs, among other purposes.

It means the end is nigh for the traditional phone book.

Growing numbers of homes are choosing to become ex-directory while 118 telephone services and the internet provide faster and more convenient ways to look up numbers.

The decline means 57,000 tons of paper - or 50billion pages - are wasted each year.

According to a survey by recommendation service Rated Tradesmen, 63 per cent of people who receive phone books never use them.

The poll of 1800 adults found 71 per cent preferred to use the internet.

One in five said this gave them more choice and five per cent said they did not trust adverts in phone directories.

Andrew Skip with, founder of Rated Tradesmen, said: "Modern day life is more pressured than ever before.

"It's no surprise people are using the internet rather than wasting precious time trawling though a thick directory full of businesses they know nothing about.

"The explosion of online communities means that you no longer have to gamble inventor Alexander Graham and hope you've picked the right advert."

The world's first telephone directory was published in 1878 in Connecticut.

It covered just 50 names in New Haven, though a more substantial book was published in Chicago eight years later which claims to be the first thorough directory.

The first one in Britain was published in 1880.

It featured 248 names and addresses including the telephone inventor himself, Alexander Graham Bell.

Buckingham Palace was also listed, as was Sherlock Holmes author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

But it did not have their phone numbers. Callers had to ring the operator and ask to be put through.

By 1925, numbers were included, including Winston Churchill's Paddington 1003. Alfred Hitchcock and his number were in the 1934 book.

Today, BT issue 20million books, while there are 28million from Yellow Pages and 22million from Thomson Local.

The average book has 1100 pages, weighs 3lb and is nearly 1.5 inches thick.

CAPTION(S):

GIVE ME A BELL: Phone inventor Alexander Graham