What was it like? Pre-Internet Hobby?

[Yowzer]

I've been thinking about the thread with the old term "Hookers" and some posts in it that I mention my distain for the term and other terms like it. What I have concluded is that those are the terms I discovered as a older boy/young man. My idea of a Prostitute or Hooker was a New York street walker with some flashy pimp. And the whole thing in my young mind was very seedy. The term whores was even worse for me. Now envisioned as what you find in the dumpy adult video stores (cheap, ugly, fat and nasty).

When I was young growing up in the 70s and 80s the threat of disease was real (and not AIDs). Who else got freaked out in health class when it came to VD and hearing that you could catch it from prostitutes?

Then a nicer term came along: call girl and later escort. And my movie memory goes back to Jane Fonda in 1971's Klute (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0067309/). She was a high class working girl and at her hotness peak. I heard she studied and talked to real prostitutes to both understand the mentality and to play the role better. The movie was very sympathetic towards the profession compared to other movies espeically blacksploitation movies such as Shaft.

So, my question for the "old timers" s what Eric Idle's character who does the Nudge, nudge, wink, wink, say-no-more asks: "What's it like?". Pre-Internet Hobby. Were there "secret" informal groups of guys that shared info? Houston Press back pages or other rags? Not so open secret like Chicken Ranch and other places for guys to find and go to?

Of course street walkers have been and will always be there. But how did some well-to-do guy find a lady for the evening. Tip a cabbie or doorman? How did the ladies get "word" out? More bar "pickups" than are done today?

Inquiring historical buffs want to know

The thing that I'm thankful for today is the wonderful internet where good providers are at your fingertips and the feeling of general safeness from rip off and diseases. I think the old days were not as good in this regard.

[pyramider]

Well the ladies used to advertise using smoke signals and check references by beating drums and then waiting for the replies. Other than that it has not changed much.

[alluringava]

A long time ago men used to answer personal ads in the papers, etc, and correspondence sometimes began by letters. I can't imagine how time-consuming that was. I've read several autobiographies of ladies who worked in the 1970's and early 1980's and how they got their customers. Of course phone books with escort services numbers and personal ads have been around forever, but the writing letters thing really seemed archaic.

[pyramider]

Ava is a youngster.

[Milehigh65]

The city I was grew up in, and I can only speak for the 80's 90's; there were underground news papers that were specifically use for escort advertisements. The adds gave you ethnic satus, measurments, in/outcall status and the contact phone number.

You find a lady that interest you contact her set appointment (2 call system still used) you would drive to the 2nd call check point find a pay phone and call her again for finale meeting information.

[JHurt1968]

Around where I lived it was mainly personal ads and phone chat lines. Twice on out of town trips I was approached by ladies at the bar of the hotel I was staying at. SW's were easy to find but way too much drama usually.

[charlestudor2005]

I'm old enough to know. But I didn't hobby until the internet sites were available.

[Tom Terrific]

It was much more difficult, more risky, filled with greater uncertainty and just plain worse. Boards like ECCIE, My Redbook, Avenue X and others have been an asset to SP and hobbiest alike.

[Chica Chaser]

Yellow Pages and massage parlors. Streetwalkers if you liked (and like) living on the edge.

[alluringava]

Originally Posted by Milehigh65

The city I was grew up in, and I can only speak for the 80's 90's; there were underground news papers that were specifically use for escort advertisements. The adds gave you ethnic satus, measurments, in/outcall status and the contact phone number.

You find a lady that interest you contact her set appointment (2 call system still used) you would drive to the 2nd call check point find a pay phone and call her again for finale meeting information.

The Bay Area ( SF) had the Spectator Newspaper and some other swinger magazines and newsletters but that was the most famous one and the one that had a lot of escort ads. I remember in Berkeley, there was this massage parlor ( not an AMP, from what I heard from customers, there wer primarily white girls) called the Golden Gypsy that was there for a long, long time, and closed down due to 'social pressure' apparently. But when I was in school at a private women's college nearby for a spell and used to go to Berkeley, I sure as shit knew that wasn't a place where I would walk in to get my 'back worked on'. The Bay Area had a lot of massage and tanning parlors even back then.

[tia travels]

Before the internet, I used personal ads to meet up.