Telephone index

In a telephone index, comprising a stand on which a telephone may be placed and an index comprising a stack of cards, any selected one of which said cards can be presented for inspection upon pressing the respective one of a plurality of buttons, wherein said stand is in the form of a box, a drawer is slidable in said box and is spring-loaded for outward movement upon depression of any one of said plurality of buttons to present the particular one of said cards selected as the upper card in said drawer, any of said cards of said stack which are located at a position above said particular one of said cards selected being retained in said box and not moving outwardly with said drawer, the improvement comprising:

• a plurality of levers mounted in an upper part of said box, extending from the front toward the rear thereof, said levers being pivotally mounted about a common transverse and generally horizontal axis located at a position forwardly of said plurality of push buttons, each having an arm extending forwardly of the pivot axis and an arm extending rearwardly of the pivot axis with a downwardly extending projection at its rear end and each cooperating with a respective one of said push buttons such that pressing any one of said push buttons depresses said rearwardly extending arm of the respective one of said levers to move said downwardly extending projection thereof downwardly into engagement with a fixed abutment surface within said box and raises said forwardly extending arm thereof against the bias of a spring to trip a drawer catch to allow said spring biased drawer to open, and each of said cards having at least one extension at a rear end thereof, said extensions having apertures therein through which selected ones of said downwardly extending projections can pass to secure said cards against outward movement with said drawer;
• said drawer having upstanding entraining projections at the sides thereof and said cards each having portions cut out to allow said cards to engage said entraining projections, thereby to entrain for movement with said drawer a selected one of said cards and all of said cards of said stack below said selected one of said cards;
• and wherein to reduce frictional drag tending to retain entrained ones of said cards in said box and to assist return of said extensions of said cards not retained in said box onto said abutment surface upon re-closing of said drawer, a rear portion of said deck of said drawer, on which said rear portion said cards lie, is provided with longitudinally extending alternating ribs and grooves, and a freely slidable intermediate member is provided having an upper surface of the same form as said rear portion of said deck and having an undersurface thereof grooved to receive said ribs on said rear portion of said deck, the front edge of said abutment surface and the front edge of said intermediate member having projecting tongues which lie in said grooves of said intermediate member and said grooves of said rear portion of said deck, respectively.