Black Power in Montreal
The ideas, leaders and pain behind the Sir George Williams riot July–August 2013
There is an iconic Canadian image that many remember but most know very little about. It shows a blizzard of computer cards (remember those?) pouring out the windows of the Computer Centre of Sir George Williams College in downtown Montreal in the winter of 1969. Those millions of lost cards and a roomful of destroyed computer equipment worth about $2 million were the physical manifestations of a 14-day protest by black students who felt that their claims of racism against one of the SGW faculty were being…