In 2006 I mentioned how I’d been attracted to Trent University back in the mid-1980s by a recruiting film that featured a Jeep. As I wrote then, the film:
…told the story of a student arriving at Trent for the first time. She arrived in her cool Jeep, and as she pulled into the parking lot a gaggle of fresh-faced coeds emerged to help her move in. She then proceeded to benefit greatly from small-group teaching, stunning architecture and the proximity to the Trent Canal.
A few weeks ago I decided that I needed to seek out the film. It’s been almost 25 years since I would have seen it, but I figured that it was an important enough artifact to have been saved somewhere.
Alas I heard back from the Trent University Archives that they don’t have a copy in their collection, and I heard back today from a friend at Trent who works in communications that the Registrar’s Office doesn’t have a copy either. She writes “There was a box of old films that was destroyed during the flood, so that might explain why we no longer have record of it.”
It appears, thus, that I will have to keep the memory of the film alive in my imagination. If you went to Trent in the 1980s, to you remember this film? Maybe I made it up?
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I am Peter Rukavina and this is my blog. I am a writer, letterpress printer, and a curious person.
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I went to Trent in the early
I went to Trent in the early 80s and remember the film very well. A friend stole/borrowed? a copy and we watched it backwards on a projector from the public library, killing ourselves laughing. The scene that sticks out is a young woman in pink track pants getting out of a jeep in front of Lady Eaton College. The univeristy was clearly trying to recruit a different type of student and I don’t know if we were more offended by the jeep or the pink track pants, neither of which were seen around Trent in those days. Have you tried contacting the Trent Archives?
It was shown in Cultural
It was shown in Cultural Studies 100 when I was a TA in 1993. I bet Sean Kane (English/Cultural Studies) would know if there is a copy anywhere. By the way, Peter, have you read Sean Kane’s novel, Virtual Freedom, a thinly-veiled spoof about Trent U. and its eccentricities?
This film was made during my
This film was made during my first year at Trent—1981—and I wrote an essay on it (called “We Brought Out the Myth on You”) for Sean’s Cultural Studies class! I think the film was called “We Bring Out the Best in You…” We watched it over and over on a white sheet taped up on a wall in Reade House, and killed ourselves laughing. Maybe the Communications Office (in Advancement) would have a copy.
Here it is 2024, over 40
Here it is 2024, over 40 years since I attended Trent and I remember the film myself and 2 teammates from the fencing team were a part of it too bad it’s gone
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