 | The examples and perspective in this article deal primarily with U.S. and Canada and do not represent a worldwide view of the subject. (November 2025) |
Blue pages are a telephone directory listing of American and Canadian state agencies, government agencies, federal government and other official entities, along with specific offices, departments, or bureaus located therein.
Canada
Canadian yellow-page listings indicated "Government Of Canada-See Government Listings In The Blue Pages"; in markets where the local telephone directory was a single volume, the blue pages and community information normally appeared after the alphabetical white-page listings but before the yellow pages advertising.[citation needed] The blue page listings included both provincial and federal entities.[1] The Canadian government ceased publishing phone numbers for each federal department in 2015, although individual provinces and municipalities continued to give local information.[2]
United States
In the United States, the blue pages included state, federal, and local offices,[3] including service districts such as school districts, port authorities, public utility providers, parks districts, and fire districts.[citation needed] Starting in 1997, the blue pages also provided information about government services, in addition to officials' names, addresses, telephone numbers, and other contact information.[4] They were published either separately from the rest of the phone book, or consolidated into one volume, depending on the phone company and year.[5]
Some phone books misplaced government-run businesses like Amtrak outside of the Blue pages section.[6]
The color blue is likely derived from so-called government blue books, official publications printed by a government (such as that of a state) describing its organization, and providing a list of contact information. (The blue pages published in a printed telephone directory is usually quite abridged, compared to official blue books).[citation needed]
Other
The name blue pages has been used for various specialised directories by private-sector entities, such as the internal IBM Staff directory.[7]
See also
References
- ^ Rezori, Azzo (July 19, 2015). "The blue pages conspiracy blues: Why Ottawa doesn't want you to call". CBC.
- ^ "Government to stop publishing blue pages directory - National | Globalnews.ca". Global News. Retrieved 2025-02-01.
- ^ "Alternative Basic Library Education - Basic Reference Sources". www.lili.org. Retrieved 2025-02-01.
- ^ "Blue Pages paper". ambur.net. Retrieved 2025-02-01.
- ^ Digrazia, Christine (April 13, 2003). "Who Knew Numbers Could Be So Heavy?". The New York Times. pp. CT1. ProQuest 92393810.
- ^ Eisen, Jack (April 28, 1983). "New Phone Book Problems". The Washington Post. p. 34.
- ^ "IBM Directory Server for IBM i (LDAP)". www.ibm.com. 2019-12-18. Retrieved 2025-02-01.
External links
- "USA Blue Pages" - officialusa.com, an unofficial blue pages directory for US federal and state agencies
