Gottlieb A. Adom

Gottlieb A. Adom was born on 17 November 1904 in Osu (Christiansborg). His parents were Isaac G. Adom, a blacksmith of Osu-Adjumanko and Elisabeth Ahinee Amarteifio of Osu Amantra, Odartey Sro Weku and of Asere, Accra. He was named after the award-winning German ethnolinguist and philologist, Johann Gottlieb Christaller who translated the Bible into the Twi language with the help of two Akan linguists, David Asante and Theophilus Opoku. Christaller was a two-time winner (1876; 1882) of the most prestigious linguistics prize, The Prix Volney, awarded since 1822, by the Institut de France "to recognize work in general and comparative linguistics. linguistics."  Adom's parents both belonged to the Ga-Dangme ethnic group of Accra.  Adom hailed from one of the royal families of Osu and was the grandson of Naa Botwe, Stool Mother of the Paramount Chief, the Osu Mantse’s Stool. His step-brother was Emmanuel Obetsebi-Lamptey, the Gold Coast politician and lawyer, one of the founding leaders of the United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC) and a member of "The Big Six", the group of political activists detained by the British colonial government after the 1948 Accra riots, kicking off the struggle for the attainment of Ghana's independence in 1957. G. A. Adom was also the cousin of the Ghanaian barrister and judge, Nii Amaa Ollennu who became the Speaker of the Parliament of Ghana during the Second Republic and additionally, serving as the Chairman of the Presidential Commission and the acting President of Ghana from 7 August 1970 to 31 August 1970.

He attended the Basel mission primary school at Osu. He enrolled at the middle boarding school, The Salem School at Osu, graduating in 1922 with the Middle School Leaving Examination certificate. The Salem School was started in 1843 by three missionaries, Jamaican, Alexander Worthy Clerk and Angolan-born Catherine Mulgrave together with the Americo-Liberian George Thompson. He was admitted for a five-year course in pedagogy and theology at the Basel Mission Seminary at Akropong (now Presbyterian Training College), founded in 1848 as the second oldest higher educational institution in West Africa after Fourah Bay College (founded in 1827) in Freetown, Sierra Leone, and graduated as a teacher-catechist in 1928. In 1957, the year of Ghana’s independence, he took an advanced course in theology and congregational management at the Ramseyer Training Centre at Abetifi, and was ordained a church minister on 19 February 1960. He later received a scholarship for a one-year training in journalism in Kitwe, Zambia from 1961 to 1962.

Teaching

He taught in various schools in the Greater Accra and Eastern Regions: Nsawam, Osu, Teshie, Abokobi, Ada and Nungua. He was also the school principal of his alma mater, The Salem School. When the Osu Presbyterian Middle Day School was started in 1944, he offered to run it and work for free during the school’s first year.

Journalism

The administration of the Ghanaian Presbyterian Church appointed Adom to be the Editor of the Christian Messenger, the church's news bulletin from 1966 to 1970 for a tenure of about four and a half years. He was a member of the Review Committee which revised the New Testament in Ga and Dangme. He was also a member of the Bible Society of Ghana.

Clergy activities

As a minister, he pastored Presbyterian congregations at Accra Central, Osu, Kaajano and finally Adabraka (1970 - 1974) where he retired in August 1974 after 47 years of public service. His ministerial work also took him to Basel, Geneva, Jerusalem, London, Rome and Tel Aviv. In 1969, he was seconded for special service at the All Africa Conference of Churches held in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire. He was the Ghanaian representative to the Eleanor Roosevelt Workshop on Human Relations at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, USA.

Adom first married Kate Nana Sapon Hyde, the daughter of a surveyor from Christiansborg, Accra on 17 December 1936 but the marriage was dissolved in 1948. On 26 December 1954, he married Sophia Esi Atswei Odamtten (1922 - †2006), a Ga woman from La and Osu and of distant Danish ancestry whose father was an administrative clerk in the Gold Coast customs division at the Takoradi Harbour. The Reverend Gottlieb Adom had six children: Harriet (Mrs. Boateng), Edward, George, Victor, Philip and Gloria (Mrs. Clerk).

Odamtten was a schoolteacher and headmistress who co-founded the body, Pastors’ Wives Association (PWA) of the Presbyterian Church of Ghana (now called Presbyterian Ministers’ Wives’ Conference (PMWC)) started in 1972 and which presently has strategic alliances with several sister organisations worldwide.Moreover, Sophia Odamtten was a niece of Charles Odamtten Easmon, the first Ghanaian surgeon whose mother, Kate Salome Odamtten and maternal uncle, Solomon Edmund Odamtten were her paternal grandaunt and granduncle respectively. In addition, her paternal grandfather, Koney Odamete was of royal lineage and the first and original Kingmaker (Shikitele) of the La Mantse Traditional Stool - the paramount chieftaincy of the La people of Accra. Odamete was also a nineteenth century Gold Coast fishing trawler magnate and general commodities merchant who owned a wooden barrel and distilled beverage business among other commercial activities.

Adom died of natural causes on 20 June 1979 at the Ridge Hospital in Accra. His remains were buried in the “Presbyterian clergy quarter (section)” of the Osu Cemetery (formerly known as Christiansborg Civil Cemetery) in Accra.