867-5309 repurposed as cancer support helpline
Get the Culture newsletter
Daily culture — film, music, books, the trends and ideas worth your attention. Free.
- Cancer Support Community (CSC) launched a cancer helpline at 1-CSC-867-5309, with ads framed as "Jenny" from the song forwarding her famous number to the charity after decades of prank, karaoke, and bachelor-party calls.
- CSC partnered with Gilda's Club — founded in memory of Saturday Night Live actor Gilda Radner, who died of ovarian cancer in 1989 — to staff the line with free access to professionals for patients, caregivers, and affected children.
- Tommy Heath, singer of Tommy Tutone, told People he backed the campaign because he has family members "struggling with cancer" and is personally dealing with "minor" skin cancer, adding that the disease "tends to attack unexpectedly."
- The number 867-5309 peaked at No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 in April 1982, after which many US phone companies refused to assign it; one radio station that did obtain it reportedly received 22,000 calls in four days.
- CSC's campaign, announced Monday on Instagram and at csc8675309.com, riffs on the song's "Jenny, who can I turn to?" lyric with a voiceover saying she's forwarding the number "to someone who actually wants to be called."
Why it matters: Anyone who dials the most-sung phone number in pop culture now reaches a free, staffed cancer support line — giving CSC a built-in recall mechanism tied to a 43-year-old hit. The partnership pairs a charity with one of the most-memorized phone numbers in US history, and Tommy Heath's own cancer disclosure gives the campaign an emotional hook beyond novelty.
Ask SkimNews
