A M QUARCOOPOME

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Albert Mensah Quarcoopome is affectionately called Uncle Albert or Sackey Tse.
BIRTH HISTORY:
He was born in Atukpai to John Sackey Quarcoopome and Madam Naa Korkoi Ayikuma.
OCCUPATION:
He attended the Government Boys School in Accra. After obtaining the Standard Seven certicate, he worked with the Scottish Mission Press located opposite the Holy Trinity Cathedral. Here, he learnt about publishing and recognised the need for a printing press. He secured some capital to start the Lona Printing Press, initially sharing premises with Dr Nanka Bruce in one of their family houses in James Town. The doctor’s oce was upstairs and Lona was downstairs. He transferred his children, Theo and Sammy to Government School at Mantse Abgonaa to be close to his work so he could supervise and walked them home after school.
Albert secured a lucrative contract with the local government to provide Telegram services in Lona Printing Press.
He was close to Mr K. A. Gbedemah who lived near the Turksons in Adabraka. Gbedemah was a close associate of Nkrumah who was General Secretary of the United Gold Coast Convention, later called the Convention People’s Party ( CPP). Gbedemah and Nkrumah will fetch Albert in the depth of the night from Labour House. They will walk to Lona Press where they will recount to Albert all their stories after travelling the country. Albert will transcribe and type set it all before returning home to bed, in readiness for morning staff to print without delay. He was integral to the political landscape in the then Gold Coast.
All of Kwame Nkrumah’s campaign material in the CPP era was printed at Lona. “The Sentinel” newspaper, the rst political publication in the country was printed here, and for which he is still owed money by Nkrumah. The popular Evening News was also published from Lona Press before Nkrumah transferred to Guinea Press, later to be known as the New Times Press. The printing machine still exists in storage at Scissors House.
Lona Printing Press was relocated to Scissors House, where a Lebanese warehouse on the premises was converted and duly contracted to Albert by his father, John Sackey Quarcoopome, whose tailoring business was in the main building as well.
The Lona business suffered when Nkrumah failed to pay his heavy printing bills. Legend has it that he chewed the receipt to destroy the evidence. This became a court case which Albert justly won, however, he was advised by Justice Ollenu to abandon the case as Nkrumah had risen to power and could cause untold harm.
While Albert stayed close to the political elite and got invited to high prole political events, he remained steadfast in his own beliefs and never towed the Party line thus never held any party oce.
Albert had many apprentices at Lona including his younger brother Abednego who went on to help set up Guinea Press as a Foreman. His niece, Sister Lamley worked at Lona before becoming a popular bus conductress.
Albert’s son, John Aah took over what remained of the Lona business.
SOCIAL:
Albert was married to Madam Susanna Annan, with whom he had eleven children. He has 28 grandchildren. He was a devout Anglican and was very much involved in the Adabraka All Saints Anglican Church where he was a Head Server.

LEGACY:
Uncle Albert lived in Labour House with his family all his life. His late son, Samuel Kojo-Yaw was Head of the Labour House Family before he passed. His eldest son Augustus Sackey, was proprietor of the Augustus Modern Plumbing Works and Theo Otokunor was a popular teacher, writer and celebrated best selling Author of Educational textbooks and other material in Religious Knowledge used in secondary schools across West Africa. Jonas Nii Tam is an Accountant and Albert Nii Sang is a Solicitor in UK.
Albert was a disciplinarian but he would not scold his children in public but rather quietly called them out later. His mantra had been “Train the child the way he should go and when he grows up will not depart from it”. He was an honest man, a strong personality and a man of principle who did not follow the crowd. He was not swayed by the politics of the era.
He was quite generous and is fondly remembered by the family.