He's 99, She's 97; Toms River Couple Celebrates 75th Anniversary

TOMS RIVER, NJ -- "Sit here." Jack Mascola patted his thighs as his wife, Emily, tried to decide where to pose for a photo.

As she leaned against the arm of the chair where her husband sat, he reached over and took her hand. She laced her fingers between his, and smiled. This is what 75 years of marriage look like: small gestures that speak volumes about what sustains two people in a relationship for so long.

But the story of the Toms River couple's marriage and its longevity also is one of compatibility and commitment.

"You just go with the flow," said Jack, who turned 99 in Jan. 13, as he sat in the living room of the couple's Greenbriar Woodlands home, where they still live independently.

Jack and Emily Mascola married May 9, 1943. Jack, then 24, was serving in the U.S. Army at Fort Hancock on Sandy Hook. He had started dating Emily Liguori the previous fall, after the wedding of Jack's sister, Ann, to Emily's uncle Jim.

"I was a bridesmaid in the wedding," said Emily, who turns 98 on June 29. She was 22 then, and had spent most of her childhood helping to raise her siblings after her father died when she was 8 years old. Her mother took a job as a telephone operator to support the three children.

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Jack was an orphan. He had three brothers and two sisters, and their father had died during the influenza outbreak in 1918, before Jack was born. His mother died when Jack was 6, during an outbreak of tuberculosis, and Jack and his older brother, Joseph, initially went to an orphanage. After Joseph died, Jack went to live with his sister, who raised her siblings.

Jack and Emily had met a few times because of Ann and Jim's relationship, the couple said, including a day when Ann and Jim went to visit family in Orange. Emily was there, and they had brought Jack along, she said. Jack recounts another meeting that stuck with him, where Ann came to visit him and brought Emily along, in a 2010 poem he wrote to Emily:

"It was many and many a year ago, at an Army camp by the sea
that a maiden appeared with my sister, when she came to visit me
For the Army's sake they had to make a soldier out of me
but they were whistling Dixie with my mind on Emily."

The wedding cemented Jack's interest, and one day in October 1942, "he surprised me," Emily said. Jack took her to New York City, where they went to Jack Dempsey's restaurant and then to see a movie. though neither recalls what movie they saw. It was six months later, when Jack had a furlough, that they married at Our Lady of the Valley Church in Orange. Emily's stepfather gave her away, she said.

Jack, who had been drafted into the Army prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, had his tour extended as a result of United States entering World War II. Stationed at Fort Hancock, he was a mine-layer, dropping depth charges along the Jersey Shore to deter the German U-boats that were cruising off the coast during the war. It kept him close to family.

"We got two boats confiscated during Prohibition," Jack said, a pair of skiffs that had been used by rum runners. "They were made to hold barrels of rum, which were the same size as the depth charges."

When his military service ended, the couple moved to an apartment in the Bronx. Jack worked for a company that made gun scopes, and Emily worked for Prudential Insurance. They moved to California a few years later. Jack worked for the Postal Service and they and lived outside Los Angeles for nearly two years. But two years was enough and they decided to come back east, and moved to West Orange.

"It was an adventure," Emily said. "We took different routes when we drove out and when we drove back so we could see the country." One of the trips took them through Las Vegas, which was in its infancy as a gambling mecca. "There was one casino then," she said. It's a place they returned many times afterward.

They took a similar tack when they spent winters in in a condominium in Fort Myers Beach, Florida, Emily said, with Jack doing most of the driving and Emily plotting their routes north and south.

The two not only love to see the country, but the world as well; they have traveled to China, Japan, Australia and much of Europe. They've been to Israel, and photos in their home show the couple in front of the pyramids in Egypt, and on a river rafting trip in Wyoming with family. They celebrated their 50th anniversary with a cruise with their children and grandchildren. They have gone on guided tours and traveled on their own.

One of their most memorable trips was an expedition in the North Atlantic off Newfoundland over the area where the Titanic sank, a trip they took because Jack has had a deep interest in the history and the tragedy of the luxury liner, which went down in 1912. The trip included a stop in the cemetery in Nova Scotia where some of those who died are buried. On the trip were some of the survivors of the sinking. One was a woman who was 16 when the ship went down, claiming her parents' lives in the process. "They pulled up her father's pocketwatch," Jack said, an overwhelming discovery for the woman all those years later. Another survivor was searching for his father's grave. That man learned a family secret, Jack said: his father had given a false name on the ship's manifesto, because he was trying to take his sons to America and disappear with them.

Their favorite place to travel, however, was Italy. "It's beautiful there. I think we've been there 16 times," Emily said. "17," Jack said. "He has a wonderful memory," Emily said. "He can remember my brother's and sister's birthdays, when things happened. I can't."

Emily, however, now serves as her husband's eyes in many ways. Macular degeneration has left him legally blind; he can see shapes, but can no longer indulge in reading the way he had for years. He also had to give up driving a dozen years ago. So Emily will read newspaper articles and keep Jack abreast of current events. He also listens to audio books.

One of his favorite things to listen to is opera, the love for which was cultivated when Jack was in high school.

"They brought in an Italian teacher," Jack said, and the man quickly became a father figure to Jack. The teacher arranged for tickets to the Metropolitan Opera for Jack and his classmates — "They were 40 cents then," he said — and the teacher would take the group, explaining to them the stories, what was going to happen. The stories were not very good, he said, but he loved the sound of the music. His favorite? "Rigoletto, by Verdi."

"He made me fall in love with it," Emily said. And she said it is because they share so many common interests and that sense of adventure that there has been little strife. When they returned to West Orange, Jack worked for the Veterans Administration and had been involved in helping to set up the veterans hospital in East Orange. But when he was offered a promotion to become the purchasing officer, he turned it down to set off on a new course: construction.

"My mother-in-law thought I was nuts," Jack said. " 'You don't leave a government job,' " she told him. But he wanted more for his life and for his family, and with Emily by his side supporting him, he did, starting a business building homes in Brick Township on a pair of old chicken farms. Those homes are now known as Mayo Estates, off Sally Ike Road and Herbertsville Road, not far from the township's reservoir. Emily, meanwhile, got her real estate license and sold real estate.

Emily had been a stay-at-home mother while the couple's children — Louis, born in 1946, and Theresa, born in 1953 — were growing up. "I always kept busy," she said, getting involved in PTA and various community organizations.

The couple moved to Wall Township around that time, living in a home on River Road that overlooked the Manasquan River, where they could go boating and spend evenings entertaining friends from their square dancing group. Their children were raising families of their own by then; they have six grandchildren — Meredith, Maureen, Louis, Christopher, Daniel and Jaclyn — and seven great-grandchildren: Caroline, Scarlett, Sienna, Hunter, Mason, and two named Jack, one of whom will carry on his great-grandfather's name. Most of their children and grandchildren live in New Jersey, they said. A family celebration of their anniversary is coming up, Emily said, and the couple was honored both by the Toms River Township Council and by Rep. Tom MacArthur's office.

When the River Road home became too much to take care of, the couple moved to Greenbriar Woodlands, where they live now. The ranch home is easier for them to get around, but Emily admitted it was difficult to give up driving after so many years and so many miles of adventures.

Ocean Ride picks them up and takes them to doctors' appointments, and their son visits every other week, Emily said. Friends take them to church on Sundays; they were both eucharistic ministers at St. Luke’s Roman Catholic Church in Toms River. But she likes staying active, and not driving makes that difficult. She is able to stay in touch with family and see photos of the growing brood of great-grandchildren via her Facebook account.

Last year Emily organized a "pioneers reunion," designed to celebrate the original homeowners in Greenbriar Woodlands who, like the Mascolas, had moved there when the community was first established about 30 years ago. "I loved doing it and I got so many compliments" from residents who never got out much, because they made new friends, she said.

"I've always kept busy," she said. "It kept me out of trouble." Jack, too, stayed busy, even when they moved to the Woodlands; while she was involved in the gardening club, he sat on the architectural review board. And though they aren't nearly as active now, they still have each other and their extended family.

"We've had our ups and downs, but never anything too terrible," Emily said.

"I found a way to get along," Jack said. "When we had disagreements, I tried to find one point we agreed on and concentrate on that, and the things we disagreed on would just fade away."

The life the couple has built, filled with holiday celebrations and graduations and christenings, and all the wonderful things that come with family, "that's the light of our life now," Emily said.

"We take it for granted," Jack said. "The whole experience is special."

But that light emanates quietly from the love that shines in their eyes and radiates from the smallest gestures, from the interlaced fingers to the compliments they give each other, 75 years after they promised to love each other for life.

Jack's 2010 poem to Emily is below:

It was many and many a year ago at an Army camp by the sea
that a maiden appeared with my sister, when she came to visit me
For the Army's sake they had to make a soldier out of me
but they were whistling Dixie with my mind on Emily

Our courtship was haphazard, so where do I begin?
For after all I must stand tall, we had a war to win
A furlough was coming, an opportunity
That's when you decided that you would marry me

With Louis and Theresa our little family grew
we had some anxious moments when all the bills came due
The problems came, the problems went and they were far and wide
But I could handle anything while you were at my side

Quick as a sign the years went by with all the drum and fife
So many things took place, some brought joy, some brought strife
but what's the most important thing that happened in my life?
that glorious day, the ninth of May, when you became my wife

Main photo: Emily and Jack Mascola in their home, photo by Karen Wall, Patch staff