Ronald Earl Ricker, M.D. passed away is Los Angeles on February 22, 2020. Ron was a psychiatrist, psychoanalyst, humanitarian, innovator, philanthropist, lover of the arts, gardener, collector of many things, sailboat racer, but most of all, a lover of life.
Born October 15, 1941 in San Diego, CA, Ron was the eldest son of Earl Ricker and Esther Tiffany Ricker. Ron grew up in Arcadia where he spent most of his childhood being chased by the guards at the Arboretum as he would cut through the gardens, and hanging out at the stables of Santa Anita Racetrack or betting on the horses. He attended opening day at Disneyland, enjoyed watching the Dodgers at the Coliseum, annually watched the Rose Parade from the bleachers, except when he marched in it with the Arcadia High School band, and annually attended the Rose Bowl since his father, Earl, was the announcer for the Rose Bowl. Always industrious, Ron landed his first job as a newspaper delivery boy at the age of 10 by lying, saying that he was 12. Racked with guilt, he called back to confess but they still gave him the job. By the time he left for college, his various jobs included Door to door salesman of Christmas cards, Bowling pin setter at the bowling alley, pharmacy delivery boy, gas station attendant and day laborer for Mr. Shirley with whom he helped build Chatsworth High School and JPL.
Despite confiding in his former teacher that it might be time to settle down when he entered the 7th grade, Ron went on to attend UCLA and lived at the Phi Gamma Delta House. He often likened his time there as similar to those depicted in the movie “Animal House.” Let’s just say, one time the police found Ron naked, chained to a local radio station door. (Might I add, he probably deserved it if only for tricking the sorority girls into believing that they had made the cheerleading squad.)
Despite being offered a spot at UCLA Medical School, Ron transferred to UC Berkeley to finish his undergraduate degree and follow the girl he had had a crush on since high school. At Berkeley, things didn’t work out with her, but he developed an even greater relationship with Dr. Sontag, who became a great mentor and friend.
Ron attended Tufts Medical School, where he assisted in a research study that proved that animals were capable of developing antibodies against their own cells. (Note this is extremely relevant today) (Ricker, Ronald and Stollar, B. David. “Antibodies Reactive with Specific Folic Acid Determinants” Biochemistry Vol.6, No. 7, July 1967) Ron completed his residency at LA Children’s Hospital and then completed 2 years in the National Institute of Mental Health, as Program Director of the Men’s Prison Unit of the Federal Prison in Lexington, KY (better known as The Farm). He returned to UCLA to complete a residency in psychiatry and studied to become a Psychoanalyst at the Los Angeles Psychoanalytic Institute.
In 1981, Ron founded The Linden Center. It was his greatest accomplishment. The Linden Center was a multifaceted mental health treatment center for children and adolescents. At its peak, the Center was treating 110 children from throughout the Los Angeles area, in its 3 special education schools, 6 group homes and foster family program. Ron remained its Director until 2014 when it closed.
The Linden Center was always a family affair. All 3 of Ron’s children participated. Jed worked as a teacher’s aide. Seth and Jenny both worked in the main office. Phil, his brother-in-law, was a teacher’s assistant and met his wife at Linden Center as well. Ron and I met when I started working at Linden Center in 1995. We married and worked together until the bitter end. While Ron was always the final say, the Center was a collaborative effort that was more powerful through the efforts of all those involved. It was not just a group of like-minded individuals whose purpose was to help others, but a family that supported each other much in the same way we supported the children we served.
Ron always gave 110%. Ron loved being a physician. He loved talking to people. He had a way of talking to people that made them comfortable, whether it was a patient in his office or a stranger in a coffee shop. He was especially talented when it came to talking to kids, especially those who were hardened and disappointed by the system. He advocated for his patients, staff or whomever. He often spent hours on the telephone during his “vacations” checking in, whether that meant standing at a payphone on the pier in Avalon, using the sea to shore operator to call from the Pacific Ocean (before satellite phones) or Skyping from Grenada. And before laptops, he would carry his Classic Macintosh on “vacations.”
He was often like Sisyphus rolling the boulder up the hill. He was always interested and wondering, asking questions and not assuming. He had no problems fighting an establishment that refused to see its own inhumanity and injustices. He believed in everyone’s individuality and rights. He fought against UCLA’s proposed dress code because he believed he and everybody else had a right to wear yellow and blue striped pants and poke-a-dot shirt. He established what was known as the “Ronald E Ricker Memorial Women’s Health Clinic” at The Farm in Lexington, KY to help provide contraception to the female inmates, when he noticed the inordinate number of pregnancies. He started Linden Center in response to the lack of services available to children and families with mental health and special education needs. He wrote articles for the Huffington Post arguing against different issues ranging from the medical community’s reliance on drugs and lack of proper research and training, to the stupidity of CA’s bullet train. For a brief time, he also wrote a blog about Adolescent Psychoanalysis.
And interspersed in all this, he found time to race sail boats, tend his garden, can tomatoes, pickle vegetables, re-finish furniture, travel the world, play poker, collect cars, art and wine. He loved life and lived it to its fullest. He played basketball at lunchtime with the janitors at UCLA, he raced to Cabo in hurricane force winds, shared a bottle of rum with other riders on the bus from the Costa Rican coast to San Jose, loved wine tasting in his best friend, Carl’s wine cellar, and would escape work to learn all the in’s and out’s of the old air conditioning system from Irnie, in the Linden Center school building.
Ron was loving and supportive but demanding. He did not coddle and wanted you to strive to be the best and do the best you could do. For example, Ron was called to the school when Jenny was about 8 and had hit her head on the jungle gym bars. She had a cut on her head and was bleeding. Ron picked her up from school, took her home a few blocks away. Jenny recalls: “He took a Bic and shaved my hair in the area of the cut, took a needle and thread from the house, stitched me up and took me back to school. He didn’t even wash my hair. I looked like Pippi Longstocking, my hair was so red.” Typical Ron. I have taken care of you. You are fine. Go on with life.
In closing, I think he would say enjoy life, be interested and have curiosity in both things and people, ask questions, do not presume, and fight injustice and inequality where ever you find it.
He will be sorely missed by all who knew and loved him. He is survived by his wife, Dung Bui, sister, Ruth Ricker Murray, eldest son and wife, Seth and Nancy Ricker, middle son, Jed Ricker, daughter, Jennifer Ricker, and two grandchildren, Joshua Ricker and Annalisa Ricker.
