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Normann, from England, which resulted in a Diamond Concession
Agreement on June 8, I960 (approved by the Legislature two days
later). On February 28, 1963 a Supplementary Agreement to the
Agreement with Normann's company, "The Providence Mining Company",
was signed (which was approved on March 11, 1963) and the name
of the company was changed into the "Liberia Swiss Mining
Corporation, Ltd." and the transfer of the concession to
another Englishman, Harry C. Stebbens, legalized.
On May 22, 1962, another Diamond Concession Agreement was signed
with "St. Andrews Securities Ltd.", also an English firm,
represented by Edward George James Dawe. This agreement obtained
legislative approval on April 25, 1963, Later the name was
changed to the "Diamond Mining Corporation of Liberia". The _s_ame
Dawe, representing the "Diamond Corporation of West Africa, Ltd,"
on January 8, 1964, signed an agreement with the Liberian Government
for the establishment of a Diamond Appraisal Office within
the Bureau of Natural Resources and Surveys (a governmental agency
which had been created in 1959 by an Act of the Legislature).
Renewed interest in the present decade resulted in an agreement
with the "Diamond Mining and Management Company" of the U.S.A.,
represented by its President, S. Richard Stern, on July 17, 1972,
followed by a Diamond Concession Agreement with "Globex Minerals,'
Inc." of California, U.S.A., represented by John F. A. Nisco,
on December 23. 1972. This agreement replaced Stern's
concession for reasons explained below. Four years later, on
October 12, 1976, Lee Edgar Detwiler, who was well known in
Liberia because of previous investment activities, signed a
mining concession agreement with the Government on behalf of
his company, the "Liberian Gold and Diamond Corporation". The
following year the company's name was changed into the "Liberian
Gold, Diamond and Uranium Corporation" and the concession agreement
was amended. Detwiler was neither the only nor the first investor
who showed renewed interest in gold mining, an activity which
had become increasingly attractive with the international
monetary crisis and the simultaneous rise in the price of gold
in the 1970's. On May 7, 1970 a Gold Concession Agreement had
already been concluded between the Government of Liberia and
Lawrence L. Trumbull of the abortively created "National Gold
and Diamond Corporation". Another company, the "African Mining
and Resources Company, Inc." had started to prospect for gold in
1971 and had obtained an Exploration Agreement from the Government
in 1972. The company signed a Gold Mining Concession Agreement
on August 1, 1973, after entering into a partnership agreement
with"African Mining Partners". These gold mining companies
were all financed with U.S. capital.
The seven foreign companies that entered into diamond mining
concession agreements with the Government between 1944 and 1977
aJLl showed only moderate successes, and sometimes even outright
failures. Liberia's history of diamond mining, though older
than that of e.g. neighbouring Sierra Leone, is definitely less
spectacular. Gold mining seems to share the same fate as