Ghana Library Founders
A brother and sister, Shiame and Naa Okunor, determined to break the cycle of poverty caused in part by lack of education and in honor of their late father whose dedication to education was unmatched, established the FREE COMMUNITY LIBRARY in Adabraka, Ghana. in a neighborhood devoid of any after school programs, community centers or playgrounds for the youth. It is for this young men and women who are the future leaders of Ghana, indeed the world, that the library is intended.
Naa and I are the two youngest siblings in a family of eleven* and grew up in an environment in which the benefits of education were glaring. After completing his elementary education, our father Mr. Benjamin Stephen Okunor and his wife Mrs. Dorothea Naaki Okunor relocated from our ancestral village Bawaleshie to Accra, the capital of the then colonial Gold Coast, now Ghana to further his education and to seek employment. He did both. He obtained certificates in Pitman’s Shorthand, a set of administrative skills in high demand then. That extra education helped him secure an administrative position in the Gold Coast Judicial System and retired as the Chief Clerk of the Law Office of the Supreme Court. Our parents’ total conviction in education manifested in their insistence, even during those difficult and oppressive colonial times, that all their children obtain as good education as they can possibly afford. When our father died in 1975, thirty-one years after our mother passed, he had educated a Bank Manager, a State Auditor, a Supreme Court Judge, a Ph. D and a cadre of educated children. Therefore, establishing the GHANA FREE COMMUNITY LIBRARY by my sister and I is, first and foremost, our posthumous love and deep appreciative bow to our great parents, especially to our father Mr. Benjamin Stephen Okunor, the great “old man”. But most importantly, the Library is a tangible evidence of our undiminished inherited conviction in and dedication to education. Finally, the library underscores our continuing support for the educational aspirations of some of our neighborhood youth and an inspiration to others to secure the benefits of education. Thanks Dad.
SHIAME & NAA TORSHIE
*the family was later joined by two stepbrothers.
Naa and I are the two youngest siblings in a family of eleven* and grew up in an environment in which the benefits of education were glaring. After completing his elementary education, our father Mr. Benjamin Stephen Okunor and his wife Mrs. Dorothea Naaki Okunor relocated from our ancestral village Bawaleshie to Accra, the capital of the then colonial Gold Coast, now Ghana to further his education and to seek employment. He did both. He obtained certificates in Pitman’s Shorthand, a set of administrative skills in high demand then. That extra education helped him secure an administrative position in the Gold Coast Judicial System and retired as the Chief Clerk of the Law Office of the Supreme Court. Our parents’ total conviction in education manifested in their insistence, even during those difficult and oppressive colonial times, that all their children obtain as good education as they can possibly afford. When our father died in 1975, thirty-one years after our mother passed, he had educated a Bank Manager, a State Auditor, a Supreme Court Judge, a Ph. D and a cadre of educated children. Therefore, establishing the GHANA FREE COMMUNITY LIBRARY by my sister and I is, first and foremost, our posthumous love and deep appreciative bow to our great parents, especially to our father Mr. Benjamin Stephen Okunor, the great “old man”. But most importantly, the Library is a tangible evidence of our undiminished inherited conviction in and dedication to education. Finally, the library underscores our continuing support for the educational aspirations of some of our neighborhood youth and an inspiration to others to secure the benefits of education. Thanks Dad.
SHIAME & NAA TORSHIE
*the family was later joined by two stepbrothers.