… and boy-foot bear with teak of Chan … no, no, Kent McCord and the Nelsons’ Rick, that’s the ticket.
(Tales of male-male desire and sexual acts — so this posting will be edgy for some readers — but not particularly vivid tales, and the photos are there for faces and torsos, not genitals)
Rick and Kent, figures of attractive, desirable masculinity — the first from my teenage years (there was a lot I didn’t understand in the Rick, or teenage hard-on, years, during which Ricky got me off, a lot), the second from young adulthood (it was during the Kent years that I gained some self-knowledge and entered into serious, life-long relationships with other men; suddenly it was important that Kent was not only a really hot guy as Officer Jim Reed on Adam-12, but that he also presented himself as a sturdy, dependable and empathetic nice guy, so an eminently satisfactory object of adult lust). Note: I was perfectly aware that Rick and Kent were, by all accounts, uncomplicatedly straight (as it happens, they became buddies when they worked in tv together); what I had in my head were fantasy Rick and Kent, and their kisses were sweeter than wine.
Now I tell you that Rick, Kent, and I were / are all essentially the same age; Rick 4 months older than me, Kent 2 years younger. (Rick died in 1985, but Kent is still alive, and he’s a great-looking 82-year-old.)
And while they’re interesting as objects of desire (on tv and elsewhere, notably from the 1950s through the 1970s), they get a posting here because of a characteristic facial gesture that they share: the spread-lip smile, a feature of Rick and Kent that large numbers of straight women and gay men find powerfully attractive (and that, no doubt, makes many straight men envious).
An exemplary spread-lip smiler. Over the years, I’ve pointed out spread-lip smiles in posting after posting on this blog, because I think they’re hot; I want to kiss those sweet lips, and kissing guys was the main conscious focus of my same-sex desire from childhood — at least age 6 — on. It was an inexplicable taste, but then tastes are largely inexplicable. It continues to flourish, nearly 80 years later, which is why I spent some time, in a couple of postings on this blog back in 2017, celebrating the male model Corey Saucier, beginning with this posed photo:
(#1) The fantasy is that he’s in auto repair shop, hitching a ride; curly hair, that smile, long lean torso, notable pecs and abs (allusion alert: the shirtless hitchhiker is a stock figure of gay porn)
CS was born in 1988 in Houston TX and raised in a Houston suburb; he established his modeling career in NYC around 2010. I mention these biographical details because, as I noted in my 4/2/17 posting “Corey Saucier”:
The spread-lip smile is by no means confined to SoCal, though it’s a stereotype of surfer dudes there. Part of the stereotype is that it’s the source of the unrounded variant, [ʉ], of /U/ in good etc., there: those dudes smile, with spread lips, all the time, so they can’t manage to round their lips for /U/. Mysteriously, they round just fine for /u/, as in pool and cute.
So CS shows you don’t have to come from SoCal to get a spread-lip smile. And, in fact, lots of SoCal guys, even surfer dudes, don’t have spread-lip smiles. But the smile does seem to be characteristic of SoCal males, especially common in this group. So you won’t be surprised to hear that Rick and Kent are both SoCal guys.
Rick Nelson. From Wikipedia:
Eric Hilliard Nelson (May 8, 1940 [in Teaneck NJ, but he grew up in Los Angeles] – December 31, 1985 [in a crash of his band’s aircraft]) was an American musician and actor [performing as Rick “Ricky” Nelson]. From age eight, he starred alongside his family in the radio and television series The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet. In 1957, he began a long and successful career as a popular recording artist.
(#2) Young Ricky Nelson in the late 1950s (he was shy and awkward at first; but in his family, everybody performed)
(#3) A later photo of the now self-assured performer Rick Nelson, entirely aware of his sex appeal
On me and Ricky, from a comment on my 2/7/11 posting “Old photographs”
I suspect that Ricky Nelson, just four months older than me, played a role in my highschool haircut; I had a thing for him. Then I went to Princeton, where a crewcut would have been notably unpreppy, so I changed styles — and entered my period of chinos, loafers, blue oxford-cloth shirts, and tweed jackets.
Kent McCord. It was Kent who got me into this posting, yesterday, when I was taking refuge from the news of the day in several hours of the old tv series Adam-12. Starring Kent McCord and Martin Milner. Well, I had a thing for McCord too, but a later, somewhat more adult thing. From Wikipedia on the early part of his career:
Kent Franklin McWhirter (born September 26, 1942 [in Los Angeles, grew up in the San Gabriel Valley town of Baldwin Park]), known by his stage name Kent McCord, is a retired American actor, best known for his role as Officer Jim Reed on the television series Adam-12.
… First using his real name on television in 1962 in The Adventures of Ozzie & Harriet, he later adopted his stage name. He became a close friend of Rick Nelson and made 44 appearances on the program. He also landed small parts in five Elvis Presley films and (as Kent McWhirter) portrayed a motorcycle courier in McHale’s Navy in the episode “Monkey Business 007”. McCord also appeared in the first episode (September 14, 1967) of Raymond Burr’s Ironside series, titled “Message from Beyond”, as motorcycle cop Kellogg.
In the first season of Jack Webb’s Dragnet (1967), he appeared three times. … McCord went on to appear five additional times in the second season
…McCord’s big break came in 1968 when he was given a lead role next to Martin Milner as rookie police officer James A. “Jim” Reed on Adam-12, a police drama television series created by Jack Webb. The show ran on NBC from 1968 to 1975.
He then had a long career in tv, film, and theater as a reliable, versatile member of the Acting Corps; on his personal website, he presents himself as a community-minded straight arrow, an athletic guy guy, and a generally earnest nice guy. A PR photo of him as officer Jim Reed on Adam-12, showing the spread-lip smile:
(#4) From the Facebook page Iconic Cool (“a collection of cool pictures of celebrities and icons from today and yesterday”)
Now, out of uniform, shirtless by a swimming pool, in a very amateur photo. From Lincoln X-ray Ida: My blog about Adam-12, “Log 1031: The Hollywood Show” by Keely Schultz on 11/1/15:
(#5) [from Schultz:] Kent did not remember where these photos were taken, why they were taken, or who had taken them. I jokingly asked if it was really him in the photos. He replied that he knew it was him because of his tattoo. Wait, what? That’s when Kent pointed out the faint black mark on his bicep and explained that it was a tattoo of the letter “K” he had done himself at age 11!
His eyes might be shut, but he’s still got that smile.
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