Ric Masten, Teen, Carmel (Nancie’s note) Taken in friend Nancie Brown’s front yard
Remembrances of Ric Masten, 1946
By Nancie M. Brown, July 28, 2008
Ric Masten lived in my Carmel neighborhood in the 1940’s. He always referred to me as “the girl from around the corner” through his last days. When I accepted a date from him in 9th grade, I could not have anticipated our friendship would grow and deepen through six decades, that he would marry one of my best friends, Billie Barbara Bolton who I had known since 7th grade. Nor could I foresee that the Masten children and mine would grow up to play with each other and become friends, or that despite distance and years, we would continue sharing the passages, joys, and tragedies of our lives, that we would forge an unconditional and deep friendship that continued through the end of his days and so enriched my life, as he did so many others.
Here is the story of how I met Ric Masten and our two unforgettable dates.
It was September, 1946, I was 13 and I had just started my freshman year at Carmel High School, and I attended a party of my ninth grade classmates. One of my friends, Jimmy Hare, brought his older step- brother, Ric Masten to the party. The home of Jim and Ric and their blended family (the Masten’ and the Hare’s) was around the corner from me in Upper Hatton Fields. Ric went to a private boarding school, Montezuma, near Santa Cruz, so I had never met him before. The day after the party, Ric called and asked me to go a movie the following Saturday when he’d home again. Although I had not yet dated any boy out of my grade level, my parents agreed to this date with an “older man” of 16, as after all he was Jimmy’s brother, and my mom knew of Hare family.
The big date night arrived, and I was checking my pale lipstick and freshly pin- curled hair-do, over and over. I was nervous as I had only met Ric once at the party. So I didn’t know him like I did the boys in my class I saw everyday at school. Ric said he would pick me up at 6:45 p.m. to catch the 7:00 p.m. movie at the Carmel Theatre. At 7:00 o’clock, I thought it odd that he was late, as he lived 2 minutes away. But when 7:30 p.m. came his esteem in my eyes had sunk measurably. The clock chimed eight then nine o’clock, and still no Ric, or phone call. I couldn’t stand the frozen expression on my parents’ faces, and I fled to my room and slammed the door shut. Here I was only 13, and I had been “stood up”!
It was around 9:30 p.m., and I was thinking of getting ready for bed, when the phone rang. “Nance, this is Ric. I’m really sorry; I know it’s awfully late, but I couldn’t call you before now…” I almost didn’t hear what he had to say next, I was so steamed up, I actually considered hanging up on him. But Ric continued right on, “…because my mother was having a baby.” I was speechless. This was either the most outrageous excuse I would ever hear in my life, or…could it be true…a woman old enough to have a 16 year old son would be having a baby? Remember, this was an era without cell phones, and pay phones weren’t always handy or in working order. So some leeway had to be granted for his lateness under such special circumstances. Because, yes, Mrs. Hare had indeed delivered a baby boy, named Don Hare, shortly before Ric finally called me. “And…” Ric continued, “I’d like to come over right now and pick you up. We can just make the second show at the movies.” My diffidence vanished once the reality of Ric’s situation sank in, and, “OK, I said. See you soon.’ And he was there in a shot, with that big, freckled grin on his face, and that was our first date.
We did have one more, unforgettable date that fall, a date whose strange circumstances even topped the first date. Both of us were still wearing some braces on our teeth, and when Ric pulled in front of house after this movie date, he kissed me goodnight a few times. After a few smooches, suddenly our hardware connected, and for a few moments we were locked in a kiss that seemed destined for a welding torch to free us. It was probably no longer than 30 or 40 seconds, but it seemed interminable as we grasped with the dilemma facing us, until we managed to disengage. But suddenly I cried out in pain. A wire was now poking straight into my cheek. I think it started to bleed. Ric was alarmed. I was frightened. Ric sized up the situation. Immediately he started the car, made a u-turn and whizzed around the corner, took me by the hand into the Hare household, calling loudly for his step dad as we approached from the yard. Dr. Hare was an optometrist, not a dentist, but he no sooner appraised the situation, than he got out some tools and tamed the wayward wire.
I never told my parents or anyone of this embarrassing outcome of our innocent good night kisses. But fifty years later when I was introducing Ric as a guest artist for a small art gallery I was managing in Pacific Grove, he came out with this story, much to my chagrin. Only in this telling, he had our mouths wired together like we were Siamese twins as he drove the car to his home and we entered, enmeshed, into his parent’s home to get help. Thereafter, Ric embellished the story any chance he could get to tell it. Ric was a born storyteller and, as we know, many of his stories became poems or songs. Nothing and no one was sacred, we were all fodder for his sense of humor and creativity. I have always been grateful that he never wrote a poem about our “metallic attraction” when we were teens.
PS: Editing and reviewing the material I sent you on Ric made me feel close to him again, but it has also reawakened the ache that he is gone to me and to us all who loved him. His cowboy boots can never be filled.
Ric Masten’s own hand-written photos/notes on the back of these photos taken in Europe:
By Nancie M. Brown, July 28, 2008
Ric Masten lived in my Carmel neighborhood in the 1940’s. He always referred to me as “the girl from around the corner” through his last days. When I accepted a date from him in 9th grade, I could not have anticipated our friendship would grow and deepen through six decades, that he would marry one of my best friends, Billie Barbara Bolton who I had known since 7th grade. Nor could I foresee that the Masten children and mine would grow up to play with each other and become friends, or that despite distance and years, we would continue sharing the passages, joys, and tragedies of our lives, that we would forge an unconditional and deep friendship that continued through the end of his days and so enriched my life, as he did so many others.
Here is the story of how I met Ric Masten and our two unforgettable dates.
It was September, 1946, I was 13 and I had just started my freshman year at Carmel High School, and I attended a party of my ninth grade classmates. One of my friends, Jimmy Hare, brought his older step- brother, Ric Masten to the party. The home of Jim and Ric and their blended family (the Masten’ and the Hare’s) was around the corner from me in Upper Hatton Fields. Ric went to a private boarding school, Montezuma, near Santa Cruz, so I had never met him before. The day after the party, Ric called and asked me to go a movie the following Saturday when he’d home again. Although I had not yet dated any boy out of my grade level, my parents agreed to this date with an “older man” of 16, as after all he was Jimmy’s brother, and my mom knew of Hare family.
The big date night arrived, and I was checking my pale lipstick and freshly pin- curled hair-do, over and over. I was nervous as I had only met Ric once at the party. So I didn’t know him like I did the boys in my class I saw everyday at school. Ric said he would pick me up at 6:45 p.m. to catch the 7:00 p.m. movie at the Carmel Theatre. At 7:00 o’clock, I thought it odd that he was late, as he lived 2 minutes away. But when 7:30 p.m. came his esteem in my eyes had sunk measurably. The clock chimed eight then nine o’clock, and still no Ric, or phone call. I couldn’t stand the frozen expression on my parents’ faces, and I fled to my room and slammed the door shut. Here I was only 13, and I had been “stood up”!
It was around 9:30 p.m., and I was thinking of getting ready for bed, when the phone rang. “Nance, this is Ric. I’m really sorry; I know it’s awfully late, but I couldn’t call you before now…” I almost didn’t hear what he had to say next, I was so steamed up, I actually considered hanging up on him. But Ric continued right on, “…because my mother was having a baby.” I was speechless. This was either the most outrageous excuse I would ever hear in my life, or…could it be true…a woman old enough to have a 16 year old son would be having a baby? Remember, this was an era without cell phones, and pay phones weren’t always handy or in working order. So some leeway had to be granted for his lateness under such special circumstances. Because, yes, Mrs. Hare had indeed delivered a baby boy, named Don Hare, shortly before Ric finally called me. “And…” Ric continued, “I’d like to come over right now and pick you up. We can just make the second show at the movies.” My diffidence vanished once the reality of Ric’s situation sank in, and, “OK, I said. See you soon.’ And he was there in a shot, with that big, freckled grin on his face, and that was our first date.
We did have one more, unforgettable date that fall, a date whose strange circumstances even topped the first date. Both of us were still wearing some braces on our teeth, and when Ric pulled in front of house after this movie date, he kissed me goodnight a few times. After a few smooches, suddenly our hardware connected, and for a few moments we were locked in a kiss that seemed destined for a welding torch to free us. It was probably no longer than 30 or 40 seconds, but it seemed interminable as we grasped with the dilemma facing us, until we managed to disengage. But suddenly I cried out in pain. A wire was now poking straight into my cheek. I think it started to bleed. Ric was alarmed. I was frightened. Ric sized up the situation. Immediately he started the car, made a u-turn and whizzed around the corner, took me by the hand into the Hare household, calling loudly for his step dad as we approached from the yard. Dr. Hare was an optometrist, not a dentist, but he no sooner appraised the situation, than he got out some tools and tamed the wayward wire.
I never told my parents or anyone of this embarrassing outcome of our innocent good night kisses. But fifty years later when I was introducing Ric as a guest artist for a small art gallery I was managing in Pacific Grove, he came out with this story, much to my chagrin. Only in this telling, he had our mouths wired together like we were Siamese twins as he drove the car to his home and we entered, enmeshed, into his parent’s home to get help. Thereafter, Ric embellished the story any chance he could get to tell it. Ric was a born storyteller and, as we know, many of his stories became poems or songs. Nothing and no one was sacred, we were all fodder for his sense of humor and creativity. I have always been grateful that he never wrote a poem about our “metallic attraction” when we were teens.
PS: Editing and reviewing the material I sent you on Ric made me feel close to him again, but it has also reawakened the ache that he is gone to me and to us all who loved him. His cowboy boots can never be filled.
Ric Masten’s own hand-written photos/notes on the back of these photos taken in Europe:
Ric Masten Dancing (Nancie’s note) Ric Masten and Owen Greenan rehearsing for a number from “This Is It”, a musical written by Masten, Greenan and Mike Monahan and performed at the Forrest Theatre in Carmel, 1951.
Ric Masten,Italy 1947-48. “Our boy, same shirt,” as he said, “Does anyone know where the train station is?”
Ric - Italy Ric Masten 1947-48. Italy “This is taken by the fountain in the plaza in front of St. Peter’s Church. I’m the thing with shirt on.”
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