Lawrence Henry Yaw Ofosu-Appiah

Lawrence Henry Yaw Ofosu-Appiah (18 March 1920 – 1 June 1990) was a Ghanaian academic who taught classics at the University of Ghana and was subsequently Director of the Encyclopedia Africana.

His parents were Seth Fianko — a teacher and a descendant of the royal family of Kubease, Larteh, Ghana — and Agnes Fianko (née Reynolds) — also a teacher and a descendant of the royal family of Akropong, Akwapim, Ghana.

In March 1944, the Achimota Council awarded him a scholarship to Oxford University, United Kingdom, and he was accepted at Hertford College.

In April 1951, he took his Master of Arts Degree and ceased to be a Junior Member of Oxford University from that date.

He was the first African master of the hall and the installation was done by Professor Adu Boahen, the Senior Tutor at the time.

Ofosu-Appiah was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship and the post of Visiting Professor of Classics at Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, United States, for the academic year 1964-65.

Ofosu-Appiah accepted the position of Director of the Encyclopedia Africana Project in Accra in August 1966.

In 1970, when asked by the government of the Second Republic to continue as the Chairman, he created a new Ghana Library Board Act, which was implemented in June 1970.

In September 1967, he was appointed a member of the Board of Directors of the Ghana Airways Corporation until April 1969.

After the inauguration of the Second Republic took place in 1969, he was offered the Chairmanship of the Ghana State Housing Corporation.

He was also elected to the National Executive of the Progress Party in 1970 and subsequently appointed the Chairman of a Committee on the Winneba Training College.

In October 1968, he won a seat on the board of the Ghanaian Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR).

In 1962, Ofosu-Appiah translated Homer's Odyssey into Twi, and it was used as a set book by the Ministry of Education of Ghana.

Again in 1975, Ofosu-Appiah began writing an English-Twi dictionary with the help of Mr E. O. Koranteng, who was, at the time, on the staff of the University of Ghana Language Centre.

His wife died on 12 May 2012 in Ghana and her ashes were brought to the Vale Cemetery for interment as she requested, being buried in his grave on 21 June 2012.