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Image credit:
Bill Keay/Vancouver Sun
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Ellison's
Quest
At Prince of Wales in the 1970s and ’80s,
Tom Ellison had a gift for making his female students
go to almost any length to please him. I was one of
them.
By Jane Green
I FIRST ENCOUNTERED TOM ELLISON in the hall at Prince
of Wales high school in Shaughnessy when I was in Grade
8. It was 1978. Pierre Trudeau was prime minister, and
Kim Campbell—a Prince of Wales grad—was
15 years away from becoming the first woman to hold
that office. I was 13 years old, the fourth of five
children of a doctor and a nurse. Tom was a handsome,
single teacher in his thirties with a cocky smile, a
deep voice and the sort of looks that let him model
for Woodward’s. At school he ran a program called
Quest. Selected students spent a semester foregoing
the classroom in favour of canoeing, hiking, skiing,
rock climbing and biking.
One of the other Quest teachers told Tom who my older
sisters were. He looked me up and down in the hall and
feigned shock. I knew my measurements from sewing class—28/28/28—so
I understood. He asked me to smile, so he could see
my teeth. I felt like a horse on the auction block.
When I obliged him he said yes, I must be one of them,
all right, because I had a gorgeous smile. I was meant
to feel flattered, I guess, but I thought he was arrogant.
That didn’t stop me from trying out for the program
when I was in Grade 10. I was a Girl Guide, and loved
camping and group activities and hiking. Three teachers,
including Tom, interviewed me to see if I was “Quest
material.” I was heartbroken when they decided
I “wasn’t ready.” It made me even
more determined, and I applied again in Grade 11. I
was thrilled when I got accepted. Tom was the coolest
teacher ever, a charismatic “rebel” full
of anti-capitalist rants and hippie ideals who loved
the outdoors and instantly made you long for his attention
and approval.
Between trips, we stayed in the Questroom, isolated
from the rest of the school. We were earning credits
towards English and Social Studies, but I don’t
remember any textbooks. Instead, the teachers lectured
us on Quest ideology—“peace, love, and save
the whales,” as we used to say. Questors were
to shun drugs and alcohol, maximize physical fitness,
and love and preserve nature. Laura Anderson, who was
a Questor during my semester in the program, found it
an intoxicating mix. “We all want to believe in
something,” she says. “At that age, you’re
looking for something to give your heart to. They captured
that in a huge way.”
There were no desks; we sat on the floor, acolytes,
while the teachers held forth. Tom gave long rambling
lectures. A favourite topic was ex-Questors he liked:
“classics,” he called them. Sometimes he
grew indignant at another type of ex-Questor, the ones
who’d betrayed him. One time he became angry because
he had seen an ex-Questor wearing a fur coat. He felt
she was thumbing her nose at his values. We joined in
his outrage, promised ourselves we’d never betray
Tom. “It was cult-like in the sense that we were
taught that what happened within those four walls was
the truth,” Laura recalls. “No one wanted
to be the one to bring that down.”
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Tom would watch
us as we came back
from our training runs, and one day he took
me aside and told me I had fantastic legs
and could be a great runner.
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Like many girls in Quest, Laura had come from another
school specifically to join the program. Cut off from
old friends, she was ready to embrace everything Quest
had to offer. It was quickly made clear that her appearance
had to change. Girls were not to wear make-up or designer
clothing; the uniform was plaid shirts, khaki shorts,
hiking boots or runners. Laura eagerly complied: “It
was all about pleasing them.”
Despite my first impression of Tom, I also wanted to
please the Quest teachers; I just didn’t want
to give up my former life. The teachers didn’t
want me to go to a drama conference I attended every
year in Victoria. Previous teachers had let me miss
a couple of days, and I didn’t understand why
the Quest teachers objected. They couldn’t give
me a good reason, so I went anyway.
Each school day began with a workout in the Questroom,
across from the principal’s office. When we did
Simon Says to warm up, Tom would have us touch our breasts,
often teasing this or that girl about her development.
When we did stretching, he’d walk around and make
lewd comments about what he could see, and we’d
giggle nervously. I was insecure about my athletic ability.
Tom would watch us as we came back from our training
runs, and one day he took me aside and told me I had
fantastic legs, strong and muscular, and could be a
great runner.
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