Let me start off by saying I have not done enough research here to claim to be an expert.

But I am an interested party.

I like numbers, and area codes make for cool numbers.

For example, I live in Framingham, and our area code is 508, which is also coincidentally our anniversary - May 8.

I remember when cell phones first started to become something everyone carried in the late 1990s and New York added another area code to accommodate that - 917. My cell phone has a 917 area code.

Recently one of my cousins forwarded me an Instagram link where a guy said Boston chose its 617 area code to recognize the Battle of Bunker Hill, which took place on June 17.

It’s a cool little story…but I’m not sure it’s true.

It may be - but I have not found enough evidence to support it.

But that little video did get me pretty interested in the history of area codes.

A lot of the history had to do with how you dialed numbers at the time, which of course were on a rotary phone where you actually dialed a number.

It sounds like, when this started in 1947, they at first wanted to give the big cities on the east coast easy-to-dial area codes - 201 for Washington, D.C. and 212 for New York City. But it sounds like the easy-to-dial numbers kind of overloaded the system, I think, so they started to widen the numbers out and make them a little harder to dial.

This all sounds somewhat far-fetched, now that I’m writing it out, but I did read it in a couple of places. And it would explain 617 for Boston as opposed to those lower numbers in the other east coast cities.

I don’t know that cities could choose their own numbers, either - it sounds like decisions were made for them.

So there’s a lot more to explore here, which I might do…it does seem like maybe there’s a market for a deeper dive into this topic by someone.

I’m not saying Boston didn’t choose its own area code and make it 617 to honor the Battle of Bunker Hill.

All I’m saying is that I am not finding an authoritative source to confirm that.

And I’ll add this - just because it’s on the internet doesn’t mean it’s true. It doesn’t always mean it’s not true…but it’s OK to question what you read…especially when it comes to topics a lot more important than the history of area codes.