The Company of Young Canadians (CYC) was a short-lived

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

youth program sponsored by the Canadian federal government, which existed from 1966 to 1977. It was designed to be run autonomously without government direction. It generated considerable controversy shortly after its founding: coordination with volunteers in small communities was poorly organized, and several of the youth involved in the program were prominent political activists. Among other things, it was accused in 1969 of harbouring

terrorists Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of criminal violence to provoke a state of terror or fear, mostly with the intention to achieve political or religious aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violen ...

by municipal officials from

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple- ...

, including Mayor

Jean Drapeau Jean Drapeau, (18 February 1916 – 12 August 1999) was Mayor of Montreal from 1954 to 1957 and 1960 to 1986. Major accomplishments of the Drapeau Administration include the development of the Montreal Metro entirely underground mass trans ...

. These claims were never verified.(1969
Company of Young Canadians Accused of Terrorism
CBC. Retrieved 7/7/07. In March 1970 its administration was taken over by the federal government, and in 1977 it was formally abolished. The CYC was a co-sponsor of the National Film Board of Canada's Indian Film Crew in 1968, the NFB's first foray into Native-made filmmaking. Notable alumni of the CYC include

Gilles Duceppe Gilles Duceppe (; born July 22, 1947) is a Canadian retired politician, proponent of the Quebec sovereignty movement and former leader of the Bloc Québécois. He was a Member of Parliament in the House of Commons of Canada for over 20 years and ...

, Georges Erasmus, Barbara Hall,

Phil Fontaine Larry Phillip Fontaine, (born September 20, 1944) is an Indigenous Canadian leader. He completed his third and final term as National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations in 2009. Early life Fontaine, an Ojibwe, was born at the Sagkeeng Firs ...

David DePoe David DePoe (born 1944) is a community activist and retired teacher. He is best known for his activities in the late 1960s as an unofficial leader of the Yorkville hippies, founder of the Diggers movement in Yorkville and for staging protests an ...

and

Michael Valpy Michael Granville Valpy (born 1942) is a Canadian journalist and author. He wrote for '' The Globe and Mail'' newspaper where he covered both political and human interest stories until leaving the newspaper in October, 2010. Through a long caree ...

, Ian Hamilton ( Canadian Writer ).

References

Further reading