The Elan School in rural Maine is still beating kids into shape. The tough-love
school that put manners on Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel after a
drunken-driving accident still believes in confrontation. But years of
controversy, scandal and changing sensibilities have made it a somewhat kinder,
gentler place.
When Skakel was a student in 1978, Elan's residents were routinely beaten,
berated and brainwashed into behaving.
The rich sent their emotionally disturbed and drug- and alcohol-abusing kids
there - and paid a stiff price for the privilege.
Their kids paid quite a price, too - as was revealed in the testimony of former
students at Skakel's trial for the 1975 murder of his Greenwich neighbor Martha
Moxley.
They described being forced to wear signs admitting a variety of perceived sins
or faults; being put into a boxing ring to face a series of stronger opponents
until they 'fessed up to those sins; having up to 100 classmates spit at and
verbally abuse them; being paddled; having garbage dumped on their heads.
Similar tales of torture and torment fill a number of Internet sites and are
recounted in the book "Duck in a Raincoat," by Maura Curley.
In one case, a young man describes how he and two girls were raped when they
were locked in a tiny isolation room for days with three boys after being told,
"Whatever goes on in there, goes on."
Noted Curley, "The philosophy was you were abused and you abused."
Today, while confrontation remains a key element of the school's philosophy,
professionals are making the rules and meting out punishment instead of
untrained former residents.
It's better - "but it's still not a walk in the park," Curley said.
Ben Foster, a 1980s Elan alum and now a lead singer of the punk-rock group
Screeching Weasel, paid a visit two years ago and was pleasantly surprised.
"The changes they've made are incredible," he told the Bangor Daily News.
"They're still tough, but there's more compassion than in my day."
Alum Marty Kruglick, now an Elan director, told the paper: "Basically, it's
evolution. As society has changed, so has Elan."
These days, the boxing ring is rarely used - and when it is, it's only for
bullies, said Elan lawyer Ed McCall.
General meetings are still held occasionally, he said, stressing, "There's a
function and a purpose to all of the group encounters."
