Communities have long understood that leadership does not sustain itself. It has to be cultivated deliberately, one generation after the next. In 1962, a plane crash at Orly Airport in France took the lives of more than 100 members of Atlanta’s civic and cultural community. The loss showed how much a city can depend on a small group of people—and why it matters to prepare more people to step forward. That work had already begun. In 1960, Leadership Philadelphia graduated its first class, helping establish a new model for community leadership programs. The idea was simple: bring people together, help them understand their community, and prepare them to serve. Chambers of commerce helped spread the model across the country. Leadership Savannah followed in 1962, and Leadership Atlanta welcomed its first class in 1969. By 1980, the movement had formed a national association. Today, more than a thousand community leadership programs operate across the United States. Canton became part of that story in 1987, when the Canton Regional Chamber of Commerce established Leadership Canton. The program later became Leadership Stark County as its reach expanded across the county. What began as one annual class has grown into a family of programs serving high school students, young professionals, and experienced leaders. Nearly four decades later, the purpose remains the same: prepare people to lead, connect them to their community, and help them make a lasting difference.