Ila Appleby's lifelong love for Nelson Elementary started in Grade 1.
It was then, in 1958 in Miss Robinson's class, that Ila the little girl decided to be a teacher.
So she graduated from high school, went on to Burnaby's Simon Fraser University and studied to become a teacher.
And sure enough, about 14 years later, Ila the grown woman was at the front of the class teaching the next generation of elementary students.
She was 21 years old when she started her career, and after five other Burnaby schools, she settled at Nelson Elementary, in the very classroom she had sat as a young child more than three decades earlier.
"It was strange at first," she says. "Walking through those walls and halls, everything was so much the same but different. It was eerie at first, going to check those nooks and crannies I knew still existed."
And those curious little hidden spots and forbidden places that tantalize children are exactly where she took her students. She led them to the bathrooms of the opposite sex, the staff room, the crawl space behind a stock room - all to demystify those spaces.
"If they just know about them and experience them, they are not distracted about them anymore," she says.
Ila took on Appleby, her husband's last name, but her students will know her as Mrs. Chapman. She taught Grade 6 and 7 at Nelson, and every other school she worked at was in Burnaby.
Appleby notes that she's come full circle, from student to teacher.
"I loved my time at Nelson when I was a kid, and I loved it my last 10 years of teaching," she says.
Appleby is one of members of an organizing committee getting ready for the school's 100th anniversary celebration this September, so even though she's retired, she's still volunteering at Nelson.
"(It's) a huge milestone for the school, (there's) lots of history, lots of getting together with people that I used to know," she says. "It's a huge thing. How many buildings turn 100? And how many people can say they attended, taught and are now on the committee? . It's a big, big deal for me."
Calls and emails have been sent out to former students, even from the late 1920s, and the school is inviting former staff and students to the planning meeting on Wednesday, Feb. 15 in the school's library. (Call 604-664-8784 for more information.)
There will likely be regular monthly meetings leading up to the celebration, so there are plenty of opportunities to get involved.
If anyone has pictures of Nelson or memorabilia to share, Appleby said the group would love it if they contact the school. There was also a school time capsule buried in 1992 that will be unveiled, but no one knows exactly where it is. If anyone knows the precise location, that would help, too, she added.
