The Ohio Daily Express

$100,000 Subsidiary
To Liberia Company
To Start Industries

NEW YORK, Sept. 1. (ANP)
The third major project of the Liberia company, organized last September as a "pioneer experiment" to develop the economy and social standards of the African republic with American capital, was launched here last week, when a $100,000 subsidiary was set up to carry on the development program. The first two major projects were the Liberian International Airways, Ltd., and the Liberia Cold Storage Company, Inc.
The new project called the Liberian Products company is designed to train native labor in pilot plants in logging, saw milling, tinsmithing, textile production, palm oil processing and fishing industries. Except for the logging and saw mill products, everything produced will go for native use. No census has ever been taken in Liberia, but it is estimated that there are 1,500,000 natives in the country.
Head of new project is Maj. Gen. William W. Richards, colonel commandant of the royal ordnance corps, who directed the British army program of local manufacturers in the middle east during the war. In his former post, Richards handled the expansion of local production in Egypt, East Africa and the Sudan under emergency conditions.
He left New York last week for a short stay in England and is expected to reach Liberia toward the end of September to get the program moving. It is said that the program will be well underway within three to six months.
The airline project began regular flights from Dakar to Monrovia on the Africa last week. The storage program is setting up freeze lockers and other refrigeration equipment to aid the development of the fishing industry created under the products group. Eventually there are to be 26 such affiliates operating everything from hotels to laundries.
Every phase of the entire program must include by agreement a plan for improving the living standards of the natives, it was pointed out.
Edward R. Stettinius, Jr., chairman of the Liberia company's board of directors and former U. S. secretary of state, developed the idea originally with Gabriel L. Dennis, Liberian secretary of state. American private capital and business planners are to be used to expand public education, health and welfare of the republic as well as its economy.
The whole plan is backed by two holding companies- the Liberia company and Stettinius associates--with a $1,000,000 capitalization and 1,000,000 stock shares. Of the shares, Liberia receives 250,000 and an additional 100,000 goes to the Liberian Educational foundation.