A Times reader recently complained in Jack...

A Times reader recently complained in Jack Smith’s column that alphabetical telephone numbers, such as DIAL-DWP, take too long to dial.

“By the time you have searched out the letters,” said Ray G. Coutchie, “you could have punched the numbers out, had your conversation and hung up.”

Coutchie added: “This particular item has bugged me for some time.”

Funny, how times change.

Three decades ago, many Californians were upset over the disappearance of letter prefixes from their phone numbers. HOllywood, for instance, was replaced by 46, ATlantic by 28, and VErmont by 83.

Ma Bell’s “digitalization” campaign inspired the formation of the Anti-Digi Dialing League in San Francisco and the Utility Users League in Los Angeles, which fought valiant, if unsuccessful, battles.

The dismay was in part nostalgic.

San Francisco attorney Melvin Belli said that dropping a letter prefix was like “tearing down a stately Victorian mansion and replacing it with a a parking lot.”

But there was also fear that it would be difficult, if not impossible, to remember a seven-digit number.

A Pacific Telephone vice president inadvertently lent credence to that theory when he was questioned by an attorney for the Utility Users League at a hearing in 1964.

“Don’t you have trouble remembering seven digits?” the attorney asked.

“None at all,” the vice president replied.

“Please tell me your license plate number,” the attorney said.

The vice president recited the three letters on his plate but couldn’t remember the three digits.

Speaking of letters and numbers:

Michael Tscheekar of Westchester challenges anyone to pronounce the name of the street sign on La Cienega Boulevard (in accompanying photo).

“One Hundred Elevenst?” Tscheekar asks. “One Hundred One-One-Est? Or what?”

Or what seems easiest.

“Something’s Fishy” is the headline in Alaska Airlines magazine above an item about a Fishermen’s Fiesta scheduled this weekend in San Pedro.

“Fishy” in more ways than one. The magazine says that San Pedro is “just north of Los Angeles.”

As the Duke demonstrated to the Hulk, the pen is mightier than the headlock.

Gov. George Deukmejian, a Sacramento middleweight, signed a bill that in effect decreed that Hulk Hogan, Junkyard Dog, Brutus Beefcake and other professional wrestlers are entertainers, not athletes.

The bill, introduced by Assemblyman Richard Floyd (D-Gardena), stripped the state Athletic Commission of its control over wrestling, despite howls of protest from the grapplers.

“It ain’t a sport, it ain’t an athletic contest,” Floyd explained.

He pointed out that it was ridiculous to have physicians present at wrestling matches.

“It would make more sense to have them at rock concerts,” he added. “There’s more violence there.”

Perhaps Floyd has unwittingly hit upon an idea: A state Rock ‘n’ Roll Commission.

The calendar says it’s fall, but spring is still in the air, judging from the personals column in the newspaper LA Weekly.

The publication, which divides its entries into categories, drew 186 ads in its current edition, compared to 118 in May.

LA Weekly’s latest Hubba Hubba Barometer breaks down this way: “Men Seeking Women” (104), “Women Seeking Men” (34), “Men Seeking Men” (33), and “Women Seeking Women” (12).

Biggest percentage gainer was a fifth category that increased from one to three entries.

It’s labeled “Either.”