It didn't look this promising 50 years ago.

• Author: Atkins, Michael
• Position: President's Note - Column

Fifty years ago, I was closing in on 19 and was about to graduate from Grade 13 at Don Mills Collegiate. I hated it. I had no idea what I was going to do, but not going to high school anymore was enough to keep me going. I had perfected bagging groceries at the Dominion Store down the road and 80 cents an hour was enough to buy gas when I could liberate my mum's car. Sometimes on weekdays I'd get a shift at the car wash where I stood in a cement silo and washed hubcaps as the cars lurched by. This was my life. To stay sane, I played hockey and the saxophone in the winter and escaped to be a camp counsellor in the summer.

I knew nothing about drugs or marijuana, which apparently was quite widespread. Although I was fully capable of drinking too much (I have not been able to drink gin since age 16), it wasn't a big deal. I was pretty much bored and boring--not unlike my country, which was 81 years older than me.

We were both about to change.

The launch day was April 27, 1967. This was the day Expo 67 opened its doors in Montreal, and I swear over the next six months the country transformed. It was visceral.

We went from boring to cocky (some say smug), from risk averse to risky, and from provincial to global. French President Charles de Gaulle came over to insult us (vive le Quebec libre) in the middle of Expo and soon after that we'd move from Lester Pearson, our peacekeeping grandfather, to Pierre Trudeau, our cape-wearing confirmed bachelor. We would never be the same.

The last 50 years has produced an extraordinary number of world-class Canadian writers (from Alice Munro to Michael Ondaatje), recording artists (from Leonard Cohen to Sarah McLachlan), and our fair share of well-known actors (from Donald Sutherland to Christopher Plummer).

What Canadians forget is that much of this excitement was the result of deliberate public policy. We supported our book publishers so they could support Canadian writers. We insisted that our radio stations carry Canadian content to actually develop Canadian talent. The Canada Council for the Arts supported actors and playwrights and live theatre across the country. It is no accident we have developed an infrastructure that is fantastic for the size and breadth of our country.

It would not have happened...