Robert Raymond was the youngest of five children, son of Joe Raymond, an itinerant Queensland schoolteacher and bee-keeper. In late 1934 his mother took him to England for 'a few months' after the death of his father but they did not return for twenty years. After a good matriculation pass in 1938 Raymond was determined to follow his brother, Moore Raymond (q.v.), into journalism. After a period as editorial trainee at the Daily Sketch he was hired by Eric Baume (q.v.) for the London office of the Sydney Daily Mirror at five guineas per week. He then moved to the Australian Broadcasting Commission office and back to the Daily Mirror for whom he covered the D-Day landing. By now married, Raymond became a freelance journalist, writing a column, 'So They Say...', in the New Statesman between 1948 and 1952.
After a period as a press officer in Africa, he brought his young family back to Australia in 1957, determined to work in television. Once more employed by the Australian Broadcasting Commission, Raymond and Michael Charlton were responsible for the production of Four Corners which went to air in August 1961. Two years later he moved to Channel Nine to set up a special projects division and produced the first live network broadcast covering the 1963 election night count. With the closure of the special projects division at Channel 9 Raymond went to Channel Seven for the rest of his career, producing the Shell's Australia series of natural history programs. A lavishly illustrated book of his series, Australia : the greatest island, sold more than 150,000 copies. Raymond wrote over twenty books, most of them related to nature, but also including three autobiographical works. He also contributed columns on the environment to the Bulletin after Donald Horne (q.v.) became editor, for over thirty years.
(Source: Adapted from Dennis O'Brien, 'Robert Raymond Journalist, TV Producer 1922-2003', Sydney Morning Herald (21 October 2003); Robert Raymond From Bees to Buzz-Bombs : Robert Raymond's boyhood-to-Blitz memoirs (1992))
