The day two teen mags crashed the L.A. phone lines

It was on this day (November 15) in 1967 that more than 10,000 readers of the teen magazines Dig and Fifteen clogged the phone lines in Los Angeles so badly that incoming long-distance service was cut off to some 7 million residents for nearly two hours.

The magazines had invited readers to call their offices collect for a chance to speak with Mark Lindsay, the teen heartthrob lead singer of Paul Revere and the Raiders. According to an Associated Press account, “calls came from Australia, Tokyo, London and all parts in the United States,” and “Lindsay spoke with 300 of the callers.”