An elderly widow paid an estimated $14,000 to rent a rotary dial telephone for 42 years.

Ester Strogen, 82, leased two rotary phones in the 1960s, when owning new phones was prohibitively expensive for most people.

Strogen was paying AT and T $29.10 per month to rent the phones. Two months ago, Strogen's granddaughters, Melissa Howell and Barb Gordon, found the bills and ended the arrangement.

Gordon tells The Associated Press, "I'm outraged... It made me so mad. It's ridiculous. If my own grandmother was doing it, how many other people are?"

New Jersey-based Lucent Technologies, which manages residential leasing service, said customers were given the option of ending their leases in 1985.

It says the number of customers renting phones has declined to 750,000 from 40 million.

A spokesman for Lucent, a spinoff of AT and T, says, "We will continue to lease sets as long as there is a demand for them."

Gordon said she believes most of the customers renting phones are elderly and may be unaware they are paying thousands of dollars for a phone.