Hope St, Brunswick West.

Not a faded brick wall, but interesting none the less.

Other side, with the setting sun shining on it:

Closer … Can you work out what this might be for?

So, i’m seeing F. Pansino, with the phone number 381411. Looks like a short number!?

A quick google search later, and I’ve found that F. Pansino & Co. Pty Ltd are still in business and currently located at 441 Victoria St, Brunswick. They deal in automotive radiators and air-conditioning and their  phone number is 9380 1411. So, not only did their business pre-date the introduction of the 8th digit (the 9), but predated the 7th digit addition, too, which was around the mid 60’s

Two digit numerical prefixes (38 in this case,) were not introduced until the late 1950’s, in automatic telephone exchanges. Prior to this, phone numbers had alphabetical prefixes, as follows:

A=1
B=2
F=3
J=4
L=5
M=6
U=7
W=8
X=9
Y=0

So, they most likely started their business between the late ’50’s and mid ’60’s.

FUN FACT: This would’ve made Pasino’s phone number FW 1411, which, it turns out is the prefix for J Thomson’s phone number (FW 2262).