Jane Barbe
Encyclopedia
Jane Barbe (July 29, 1928 – ) was an American
voice actress known as the "Time Lady" for the recordings she made for the Bell System
and other phone companies. The ubiquity of her recordings eventually made her a pop-culture figure whose death drew national attention.
native who grew up in Atlanta, Georgia
, studied drama
at the University of Georgia
. After graduating, she worked as a copywriter
, though due to her poor spelling, she opted to read her first commercial
out loud to her boss
instead of submitting it in writing. He asked her to record the commercial herself.
In 1963, she began recording messages for the Audichron Company
(now known as ETC) announcing time
, temperature
and weather
, as well as recordings for early voice mail systems. In the 1970s
and 1980s
, she regularly recorded the intercept message
s used when a number is disconnected, and started sharing recording duties with (AT&T
voice) Pat Fleet
in 1981 who eventually took over Barbe's role. Barbe was selected to be the first voice on the Octel Commmunications voice mail systems and retained that role for many years. Her voice was used on all the prompts (which numbered in the thousands). Often people referred to the voice on Octel systems as "Jane" and Barbe and her husband John were named honorary life employees of Octel in 1992. Over 150 million people used Octel systems prior to the company being acquired in 1997 by Lucent Technologies
.
Through the years, Barbe's voice became well-known through the phone companies
’ use of her recordings, as well as her messages recorded for customized greetings for various corporations who bought Octel voice mail systems. The time announcements she recorded for NBS (now NIST) are used on radio station WWVH
.
Recordings with her voice are also used outside the United States, in Hong Kong
, Saudi Arabia
, and other countries. Although her native dialect
was Southern
, while studying drama she learned to adopt the “General American
” speech she would use for most of her work. When asked to record time and temperature messages for the Australian phone company, she perfected an Australian accent
by listening to recordings of Australia
n speakers.
.
She also did voice-over work on TV and films including the voice of Southern author Margaret Mitchell
in the documentary The Making of a Legend: Gone With the Wind in 1988.
Barbe died July 18, 2003, in Roswell, Georgia
, at age 74 of complications from cancer
. She was survived by her husband, John Barbe, her daughter, Susan Stubin of Passaic, New Jersey
, her son David Barbe
, of Athens, Georgia
, and seven grandchildren.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
voice actress known as the "Time Lady" for the recordings she made for the Bell System
Bell System
The Bell System was the American Bell Telephone Company and then, subsequently, AT&T led system which provided telephone services to much of the United States and Canada from 1877 to 1984, at various times as a monopoly. In 1984, the company was broken up into separate companies, by a U.S...
and other phone companies. The ubiquity of her recordings eventually made her a pop-culture figure whose death drew national attention.
Life and career
Barbe, a FloridaFlorida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
native who grew up in Atlanta, Georgia
Georgia (U.S. state)
Georgia is a state located in the southeastern United States. It was established in 1732, the last of the original Thirteen Colonies. The state is named after King George II of Great Britain. Georgia was the fourth state to ratify the United States Constitution, on January 2, 1788...
, studied drama
Drama
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance. The term comes from a Greek word meaning "action" , which is derived from "to do","to act" . The enactment of drama in theatre, performed by actors on a stage before an audience, presupposes collaborative modes of production and a...
at the University of Georgia
University of Georgia
The University of Georgia is a public research university located in Athens, Georgia, United States. Founded in 1785, it is the oldest and largest of the state's institutions of higher learning and is one of multiple schools to claim the title of the oldest public university in the United States...
. After graduating, she worked as a copywriter
Copywriting
Copywriting is the use of words and ideas to promote a person, business, opinion or idea. Although the word copy may be applied to any content intended for printing , the term copywriter is generally limited to promotional situations, regardless of the medium...
, though due to her poor spelling, she opted to read her first commercial
Advertising
Advertising is a form of communication used to persuade an audience to take some action with respect to products, ideas, or services. Most commonly, the desired result is to drive consumer behavior with respect to a commercial offering, although political and ideological advertising is also common...
out loud to her boss
Supervisor
A supervisor, foreperson, team leader, overseer, cell coach, facilitator, or area coordinator is a manager in a position of trust in business...
instead of submitting it in writing. He asked her to record the commercial herself.
In 1963, she began recording messages for the Audichron Company
Audichron Company
Audichron Company was a company founded in the 1930s by John Franklin in Doraville, Georgia, to produce the Audichron, a talking clock. By the 1970s, there were thousands of Audichron time-of-day announcers in use all over the world. Audichron had also developed a machine to announce the temperature...
(now known as ETC) announcing time
Time
Time is a part of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify rates of change such as the motions of objects....
, temperature
Temperature
Temperature is a physical property of matter that quantitatively expresses the common notions of hot and cold. Objects of low temperature are cold, while various degrees of higher temperatures are referred to as warm or hot...
and weather
Weather
Weather is the state of the atmosphere, to the degree that it is hot or cold, wet or dry, calm or stormy, clear or cloudy. Most weather phenomena occur in the troposphere, just below the stratosphere. Weather refers, generally, to day-to-day temperature and precipitation activity, whereas climate...
, as well as recordings for early voice mail systems. In the 1970s
1970s
File:1970s decade montage.png|From left, clockwise: US President Richard Nixon doing the V for Victory sign after his resignation from office after the Watergate scandal in 1974; Refugees aboard a US naval boat after the Fall of Saigon, leading to the end of the Vietnam War in 1975; The 1973 oil...
and 1980s
1980s
File:1980s decade montage.png|thumb|400px|From left, clockwise: The first Space Shuttle, Columbia, lifted off in 1981; American President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev eased tensions between the two superpowers, leading to the end of the Cold War; The Fall of the Berlin Wall in...
, she regularly recorded the intercept message
Intercept message
An intercept message is a telephone recording informing the caller that the call cannot be completed, for any of a number of reasons ranging from local congestion, to disconnection of the dialled phone, or network trouble along the route....
s used when a number is disconnected, and started sharing recording duties with (AT&T
AT&T
AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications corporation headquartered in Whitacre Tower, Dallas, Texas, United States. It is the largest provider of mobile telephony and fixed telephony in the United States, and is also a provider of broadband and subscription television services...
voice) Pat Fleet
Pat Fleet
Pat Fleet is a working American voice actress known as the registered voice of AT&T.Widely recognized for the tens of thousands of recordings she has made for US telephone companies such as AT&T, Verizon, Qwest, the former Bell System companies, and others since 1981, she is still most recognized...
in 1981 who eventually took over Barbe's role. Barbe was selected to be the first voice on the Octel Commmunications voice mail systems and retained that role for many years. Her voice was used on all the prompts (which numbered in the thousands). Often people referred to the voice on Octel systems as "Jane" and Barbe and her husband John were named honorary life employees of Octel in 1992. Over 150 million people used Octel systems prior to the company being acquired in 1997 by Lucent Technologies
Lucent Technologies
Alcatel-Lucent USA, Inc., originally Lucent Technologies, Inc. is a French-owned technology company composed of what was formerly AT&T Technologies, which included Western Electric and Bell Labs...
.
Through the years, Barbe's voice became well-known through the phone companies
Telephone company
A telephone company is a service provider of telecommunications services such as telephony and data communications access. Many were at one time nationalized or state-regulated monopolies...
’ use of her recordings, as well as her messages recorded for customized greetings for various corporations who bought Octel voice mail systems. The time announcements she recorded for NBS (now NIST) are used on radio station WWVH
WWVH
WWVH is the callsign of the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology's shortwave radio time signal station in Kekaha, on the island of Kauai in the state of Hawaii....
.
Recordings with her voice are also used outside the United States, in Hong Kong
Hong Kong
Hong Kong is one of two Special Administrative Regions of the People's Republic of China , the other being Macau. A city-state situated on China's south coast and enclosed by the Pearl River Delta and South China Sea, it is renowned for its expansive skyline and deep natural harbour...
, Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia , commonly known in British English as Saudi Arabia and in Arabic as as-Sa‘ūdiyyah , is the largest state in Western Asia by land area, constituting the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and the second-largest in the Arab World...
, and other countries. Although her native dialect
Dialect
The term dialect is used in two distinct ways, even by linguists. One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a characteristic of a particular group of the language's speakers. The term is applied most often to regional speech patterns, but a dialect may also be defined by other factors,...
was Southern
Southern American English
Southern American English is a group of dialects of the English language spoken throughout the Southern region of the United States, from Southern and Eastern Maryland, West Virginia and Kentucky to the Gulf Coast, and from the Atlantic coast to most of Texas and Oklahoma.The Southern dialects make...
, while studying drama she learned to adopt the “General American
General American
General American , also known as Standard American English , is a major accent of American English. The accent is not restricted to the United States...
” speech she would use for most of her work. When asked to record time and temperature messages for the Australian phone company, she perfected an Australian accent
Australian English
Australian English is the name given to the group of dialects spoken in Australia that form a major variety of the English language....
by listening to recordings of Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n speakers.
Other work
Barbe was also a former professional singer, meeting her husband while touring with the Buddy Morrow Orchestra, and gained a bit of notoriety in later years appearing in commercials and on television shows based on her recognition as the “Time Lady.” As a result of her extensive work, she founded the Atlanta branch of the American Federation of Television and Radio ArtistsAmerican Federation of Television and Radio Artists
The American Federation of Television and Radio Artists is a performers' union that represents a wide variety of talent, including actors in radio and television, as well as radio and television announcers and newspersons, singers and recording artists , promo and voice-over announcers and other...
.
She also did voice-over work on TV and films including the voice of Southern author Margaret Mitchell
Margaret Mitchell
Margaret Munnerlyn Mitchell was an American author and journalist. Mitchell won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1937 for her epic American Civil War era novel, Gone with the Wind, which was the only novel by Mitchell published during her lifetime.-Family:Margaret Mitchell was born in Atlanta,...
in the documentary The Making of a Legend: Gone With the Wind in 1988.
Barbe died July 18, 2003, in Roswell, Georgia
Roswell, Georgia
Roswell is a city located in northern Fulton County; it is a suburb of northern Atlanta, Georgia, United States. The 2010 Census population was 88,346. It is the eighth largest city in Georgia...
, at age 74 of complications from cancer
Cancer
Cancer , known medically as a malignant neoplasm, is a large group of different diseases, all involving unregulated cell growth. In cancer, cells divide and grow uncontrollably, forming malignant tumors, and invade nearby parts of the body. The cancer may also spread to more distant parts of the...
. She was survived by her husband, John Barbe, her daughter, Susan Stubin of Passaic, New Jersey
Passaic, New Jersey
Passaic is a city in Passaic County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city had a total population of 69,781, maintaining its status as the 15th largest municipality in New Jersey with an increase of 1,920 residents from the 2000 Census population of 67,861...
, her son David Barbe
David Barbe
David Barbe is an American musician and producer/engineer from Athens, Georgia and director of the Music Business Certificate Program at the University of Georgia. He is chief of Chase Park Transduction studio in Athens...
, of Athens, Georgia
Athens, Georgia
Athens-Clarke County is a consolidated city–county in U.S. state of Georgia, in the northeastern part of the state, comprising the former City of Athens proper and Clarke County. The University of Georgia is located in this college town and is responsible for the initial growth of the city...
, and seven grandchildren.
External links
- Information from Electronic Tele-Communications, Inc.
- The Jane Barbe Collection from Telephone World
- Jane Barbe sample recordings
- Video medley mash up of famous Jane Barbe recorded announcements from YouTube.
- Video of telephone voices Pat Fleet and Jane Barbe from YouTube.
- Rare outtake recording of Jane Barbe from PatFleet.com.