GHANA

6 March 1957
The Gold Coast (now Ghana) gains independence from Britain

The Gold Coast was the first British colony in Africa to become independent. After independence, its name changed to Ghana, and the first president was Kwame Nkrumah. Ghana is in West Africa, in the Gulf of Guinea. Its neighbouring countries are Cote D’Ivoire, Togo, and Burkina Faso, and the capital is Accra. The name Ghana comes from an ancient kingdom several 100 kilometres northwest of the modern republic.

Links to explore this further:

http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/history/
independence.php
- a history of Ghana’s independence

http://www.nkrumah.net/
- a site dedicated to Kwame Nkrumah

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/people/highlights/000914
_nkrumah.shtml
- for more on Nkrumah and an audio clip

http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/history/
- for a brief, broad history of Ghana

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/country_profiles/1023355.stm
- a very brief overview of Ghana by the BBC

http://www.sas.upenn.edu/African_Studies/CIA_Maps/
Ghana_19845.gif
- for a large, physical feature and provincial regions map

http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/ghtoc.html
- an exhaustive coverage of Ghana, well-indexed

http://www.sas.upenn.edu/African_Studies/Country_
Specific/Ghana.html
- a resource site of annotated links on Ghana

http://www-sul.stanford.edu/depts/ssrg/africa/ghana.html
- a massive resource of links to things Ghanaian

http://www.ghanaweb.com/
- a resource to Ghana, with information on the politics, culture, languages, newspapers, etc

http://crawfurd.dk/africa/ghana_timeline.htm
- a timeline of Ghana’s history

http://www.ghana.gov.gh/index.php
- the official website of the government of Ghana

http://www.lonelyplanet.com/destinations/africa/ghana/history.htm
- the Lonely Planet’s take on the history of Ghana for travelers

http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/gh.html
- what the CIA has prepared about Ghana

http://www.ibsa-inc.org/ghana.htm
http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~dee/CIVAFRCA/GHANA.HTM
http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/africa/features/storyofafrica/
4chapter1.shtml
-- all cover the history of the ancient kingdom of Ghana

And for a broad overview of African independence go to our site’s coverage of African Independence (chronology and history)