Robert Raymond

Robert Alwyn Raymond OAM (7 July 1922 – 26 September 2003) was an Australian Logie Award winning producer, director, writer, filmmaker and journalist. A pioneer of Australian television, he with Michael Charlton in 1961, co-founded the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's flagship public affairs television program Four Corners, which is still running to this day.

Early life Born on 7 July 1922 in the small rural town of Canungra, in south-eastern Queensland, he was the youngest of five children (one brother and three sisters). His father, Joe, was country school master who spent most of his career in the outback and had an obsessive interest in bee-keeping.

In 1934, Joe died after a bout of pneumonia at the age of 60. Raymond's mother, Ethel, decided to move to England where his siblings were living at the time.

Journalism career Determined to follow his brother, Moore, into journalism, Raymond headed for Fleet Street where he started as a cadet on The Daily Sketch in 1940. and between 1948 and 1952 his own column, a critical perspective on the press called 'So They Say...’ appeared in The New Statesman and Nation.

On 9 May 2003, he received an honorary Doctor of Letters degree from the University of Sydney.

Personal life Raymond married Marion and had two children, Robert and Candy. He and Marion were divorced after 25 years; his subsequent marriage in 1978 to Angela, the former wife of Clyde Packer, had been his great strength since they became partners in 1973.

Raymond's last years were blighted by ill health. He died on 26 September 2003. He left behind his wife, his two children, five grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.