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About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (April 12, 1978)
page 12 Wednesday, april 12, 1978 daily nebraskan r tc rvnrl (RlS(i(f5(OiBlnlfflini5 . , I M I :ll.... III I I . . I II IU.IMI I .. . - Escort service offers dates, but no after-hour frills By Casey McCabe The girls are attractive and personable, the clients often are high-class business men, and. the demand has been picking up. If you've read this far with baited breath, be prepared for a few surprises. The business mentioned is legitimate, is in Lin coln, and has for two months been capital izing on the previously non-existant field of escort services in the city. The proprietor of Exclusive Escorts may come as a surprise himself. Greg Lange is 20 and a sophomore in Agriculture Econo mics at UNL. As well as going to school, Lange rubs elbows daily with the executive crowd on the way to the Exclusive Escorts office on the tenth floor of the NBC build ing. The escort service has been Lange's brainchild since a visit to New York over Christmas. "I saw how high-class they were in New York, and thought Lincoln really needs something like that," said Lange. According to Lange, the main function of the service is to show out-of-towners around, escort them to dinner, the theatre or dance with them. "Traveling businessmen may be in town for the evening and don't know anyone, or even a good place to go." he said. "A lot of the time the escort may serve as a guide. Ninety percent of our customers are high class businessmen who have the money to afford such things, the others are people around Lincoln just interested in having a date." Lange has interviewed some 150 girls for jobs as escorts, and currently employs 20. He also has 20 men in the service, but said requests for male escorts are low. The years old, and the requirements for the job are "first and most important, a good per sonality, at least average looks, and good manners," said Lange. A date will cost the client $40 for four hours, plus the evening's expenses. Lange said this is cheap compared to New York rates which may be $40 an hour. The price at Exclusive Escorts prevents people from taking it as a joke, he said, and generally keeps the client's respectable. And admittedly, Lange said, there are bad connotations in the escort business. The reputation for escort services acting as fronts for call-girl operations are not un founded, he pointed out. "About half the businesses are legiti mate, the other half are illegitimate with call girls working for various prices," Lange said. "Kansas City has some illegitimate escort services, while Omaha, Des Moines and Lincoln are legit and run on a stan dard rate scale." "Traveler's know there are both kinds, but here we stress no extra-curricular ac tivities," he said. "You let them know on the phone, and there's no problem. We haven't had any difficulties yet. We have gorgeous girls, and when the girls are beautiful, they know not to expect any thing else." One of the escorts, who chose not to be identified, said her main incentive to join Exclusive Escorts was the money. "1 did want to make sure what it was first," she said "I wanted to know that it was just an escort service." She has been an escort twice so far, and says the ability to be talkative is important in entertaining the guest. iff:. ' i; '. , Iff , -... v . f - iff ' 4 f " " & " ' .' '"' ; "' X- - Photo by Bob Pearson Greg Lange, owner of Exclusive Escorts. The escort gets half the fee, or $20, and the evening's entertainment free. And the service, only in business since February has shown a profit for Lange. Exclusive Escorts has been averaging about three clients a night, and business picks up considerably on weekends. "A lot of businessmen on the floor think it's fantastic that a sophomore can start a business like this," said Lange. "We've had no adverse publicity, or people thinking it's a bad operation. As long as we remain legitimate there's no problem bring ing in money." Lange said he enjoys the prestige of the position. He has met some of the higher class people from all over the country, and hopes someday they might remember him. He said he has plans for expanding, and envisions a Detroit operation he once saw which has 500 employees, limousines for each couple, tuxedos and evening gowns. He admits it's not a realistic dream for Lincoln. I want people to be able to go back to their home state and tell them what a great time they had in Lincoln," Lange said. "And that the reason was the people at Exclusive Escorts." You may never have to be lonely again. Local merchant revives enthusiasm for slot car races By Jim Williams Let's have a moment of silence for the dead fads of the 60's - hula hoops, Super Balls, slot cars, skate boards. . . Wait, you say, I was almost run over by a skate board yesterday. Some fads don't stay dead. That's what Ron Justvig is banking on. His Great Race and Hobby Place at 1517 N. Cotner Blvd. is a temple of the reborn art of model car racing. Justvig's store is in some disarray. He said he's plan ning to open a full-range hobby shop out front. For now, though, it's devoted solely to model-car racing of every size and discription Justvig said Lincoln has about 100 serious model racers. Some are radio-controlled buffs, "driving" elaborate gaso line powered $500 machines around parking-lot courses. A radio-controlled car can be anywhere from I 8 to I 1 2 the size of the real thing, and its proportional servos let it be driven much like the real thing. And if you write one off in a crash, it costs almost like the real thing. That's probably why radio-controlled en thusiasts tend to be men who can afford it. The back room of Justvig's store is dimly lit. There's a Pepsi machine in the comer and a bulletin board at one end, carrying current standings for the amateur, semi-pro and pro racing series the store conducts. Most of the room's space is consumed by a 1 00-foot multi-lane track for slot cars, the other popular racing class. The slot car takes its name from the guide slots cut into the track. Each car carries a guide pin that fits into one of these slots. Electrical contact strips along the slot provide power to the car's electric motor. A trigger-grip hand controller regulates the car's speed. Justvig's track loops from a high-banked turn at one r i 111 tmm 1W A v , '1 Photo by Jim William, The slot car track at Ron Justvig's Great Race and Hobby Place. 1 517 N Cotner Blvd. end through a left-hand kink, an underpass, a loop, a de ceptively mild-looking squiggle and a sharp right onto the long straight back to the banking. The circuit is lined with walls, nicked and gouged from frequent contact with cars that took a corner too fast . For two bucks, Justvig's daughters will interrupt theiT chess game to rent you everything you need for an hour's racing. Hook up the controller to a set of binding posts, put your sickly green Corvette into a slot, and you're ready to make a fool of yourself. The rental cars are Whisperjets, with quiet belt-drive motors, 124 the size of the real thing. They aren't as fast as the gear-drive cars the serious racers use, but they zip down the straights briskly and are nearly indestructible. Good thing too. It's hard to suppress the suicidal desire to boil off the banking at full throttle and laugh giddily as the car flies out of the slot in the left-hander, slams off the wall and bounces accross six lanes of track. Serious competitors, the ones who show up for Just vig's Saturday races, can't afford to do that. Their cars, $50-a-crack Elfs and Isos. have delicately hined chassis that let the car body roll through the turns while keeping the wheels flat on the track. One good shot into the wall will twist the solder joints to junk. There are some high-school students who run the slots. The winner of the last semi-pro race was practicing at Justvig's track, a pale youth with a fitted wooden case holding about $200 worth of cars arid spare parts. There are people who will travel from Colorado or Kansas to shoot it out in a big slot -car race, although travel expenses run far higher than the pro series' $50 first prize. Justvig said he had even raced in a town that still showed signs of the excess that nearly killed the sport in the 60's. They'd spend $1 50 for a speed controller, he said, and replace the moving parts of their motors every five minutes. He said he hopes to keep that kind of thing out of Lincoln. So far, he seems to be doing a good job. Because no pimply high-schooler will look down his shiny nose at you if you duck in, lay down your two dollars and just fool around for an hour. I Ike enthusiasts of anything, they want you to like it. It's hard to believe people can take such a harmless pastime seriously but they don't take it too seriously. That's the secret . Student's recital is postponed Marilyn Yanik's graduate music recital, originally scheduled for Tuesday, has been postponed until May 9 at v p.m in Kimball Recital Hall An incorrect time was supplied to the "lace the Musk" column in Monday's Daily Nebraskan
