Robertsport

The town lies on Cape Mount peninsula, a spit of land separating the brackish lagoon Lake Piso from the Atlantic Ocean, 50 mi (80 km) north-west of Monrovia. It serves as the capital of Grand Cape Mount County and is the home of the city corporation.

History

In the mid-15th century, the Portuguese navigator Pedro de Sintra reached the cape, a 1,000-foot high granite promontory, which he named Cabo do Monte (Cape Mount). Cape Mount was the site of Dutch trading post, which turned out to be very hard to defend. The post never became self-sufficient, and habitually required assistance from the station at Elmina, about 750 miles away by sea. Théodore Canot, a writer and slave-trader, established a settlement in the area in 1840. In 1849 the Liberian government signed a treaty with the Vai people, acquiring the territory of Cape Mount and subsequently founding Robertsport in 1856.

Robertsport used to host the Tubman Center of African Culture, which was built in 1964 to commemorate William V.S. Tubman's sixty-ninth birthday. The institution was meant to be a world-wide center of research, and to support and promote African studies. The civil war destroyed the structure, and only the ruins remain.

Since the Second Liberian Civil War, the town, still mostly a fishing village, is being developed as a seaside resort for surfing. American visitors coming to the area after 2003 met up with a local, Robert Lomax, whom they taught to surf. Lomax taught others how to surf, including Philip Banini, who became a surfing teacher and owner of a guesthouse for surfers. As of 2022, the Robertsport Surf Club was expected to start owning its own beach property for surfing lessons and fishing trips.

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