“Beechwood 4-5789” (The Marvelettes/The Carpenters)

Today’s classic song of the day with a phone number in the title is “Beechwood 4-5789.” Back in the days when there were fewer people, fewer phones, and therefore fewer phone numbers, local exchanges were known by their letters rather than their numbers. Take the first two letters of the word and that’s your exchange prefix—which you could translate into the numbers on the telephone dial. (Yes, kids, telephones used to have dials instead of keypads.) So, in this instance, the Beechwood exchange had the prefix “BE,” which translated into the numbers “23.” (There were no letters associated with the number “1” on the telephone dial.) The number in the song’s title, then was actually 234-5789, all in a row.

“Beechwood 4-5789” was first recorded and released by the Marvelettes on Motown’s Tamla label in July of 1962. It was one of Motown’s earliest hits, reaching #17 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #7 on Billboard’s R&B chart.

The song, “Beechwood 4-5789,” was written by Marvin Gaye, Mickey Stevenson, and George Gordy. Stevenson produced and Gaye played drums on the Marvelettes’ recording. The other musicians on the track were all members of the Funk Brothers, including Richard Wylie on piano, Eddie Willis on guitar, Hank Cosby on tenor sax, Mike Terry on bari sax, James Jamerson on bass, and Eddie “Bongo” Brown on percussion.

In 1981, when Richard and Karen Carpenter were prepping songs for the album that would eventually become Made in America, Karen decided she’d like to do a remake of “Beechwood 4-5789.” Having had success in 1975 with a cover of the Marvelettes’ “Please Mr. Postman,” it seemed like a decent idea.

The Carpenters’ recording of “Beechwood 4-5789” featured Tim May on electric guitar, Tom Scott on tenor and bari saxophones, Joe Osborn on bass, and Ronnie Tutt on drums. Richard Carpenter played acoustic and electric pianos, and he and Karen did all the vocals, per usual.

Released in January of 1982, the Carpenters’ cover of “Beechwood 4-5789” became the fourth single off the album. It wasn’t a huge hit, however, peaking at just #74 on the Billboard Hot 100—but going all the way to #18 on Billboard’s Adult Contemporary chart. It was the last single released by the group before Karen Carpenter’s untimely death on February 4, 1983.

And here’s your daily bonus video of the day, the Carpenters’ ’50s-themed music video for “Beechwood 4-5789.” RIP, Karen.