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The Atlas Obscura Podcast

America’s “Quiet Zone”

The Atlas Obscura Podcast

SiriusXM Podcasts & Atlas Obscura

Society & Culture, Places & Travel

4.61.6K Ratings

🗓️ 21 September 2022

⏱️ 16 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Green Bank, West Virginia is free of wifi and cell signals due to the massive telescope nearby that requires radio silence. READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/town-for-wi-fi-refugees

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

My name is Steve Curzy, I am a journalist and spend more than a decade that I've been

0:06.6

living without a cell phone.

0:10.0

You heard that right.

0:11.0

Stephen Curzy has been living without a cell phone for about 12 years.

0:15.9

This choice led Stephen to discover a surprising place where he was not alone.

0:22.6

And we will take you there, but first we have to go back to 2009 when Stephen was living

0:26.9

in Cambodia.

0:27.9

I was working for a newspaper there called the Cambodia Daily, and I remember going

0:31.3

to sleep with this old flip phone, checking it through the night, you know, dreading

0:35.2

that call or text might or are saying, you know, Stephen, what the hell is this made

0:38.9

in your article?

0:39.9

And so when I left Cambodia, I just threw the device away.

0:43.7

When I got back to the United States, like I found myself all of a sudden surrounded

0:47.5

by people with smartphones, and I was just a struggling journalist, I didn't want to

0:51.5

pay for all that.

0:52.5

So I was like, I'll just put it off.

0:54.5

This has been like over the last decade in a world where everything has become increasingly

0:59.6

dominated by smartphones.

1:01.2

You know, people are often, they tease me about it, and they're annoyed about it.

1:04.6

It's like, well, you know, text me when you arrive at whatever we're going for a hike

1:09.6

or rock climbing, and I'll let you know where I am.

1:12.0

I have to say, well, I don't have a cell phone, so if we just say a time and a place

...

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