Liberia is on the south west tip of west Africa. It's coast was explored in 1461 by the Portuguese Pedro de Cintra. For three centuries its exports were gold slaves and pepper. In 1822 it was settled by the American Colonization Society as a homeland for freed slaves, hence its name. Although Liberia has had its own limited issues of coinage since 1847, it was using coins of British West Africa until 1943, when it adopted the US dollar as its legal tender currency. Since then it has continued to