Ronald A Harrison (1891-1968) was the son of Thomas Samuel Harrison, the man who was so important for the development of stamp printing in
Australia. But while the family was still in England, both father and son
worked at Waterlow Brothers & Layton. The first (and only) stamp engravings
from son Ronald date from this time. In 1907 he engraved the
Costa Rica telegraph stamps and in 1910 a Brazilian revenue stamp.
While the bulk of their work in the early 1910s was focused on
banknote printing, the two Harrisons were also involved in producing Australia’s
first postage stamps. Son Ronald was responsible for the designs of its first
stamps, which would be engraved by his father.
In fact, Ronald’s work would mainly consist of stamp design,
and many of those early Australian classics are his work. He would, however,
never match the engraving skills of his father, and as such his engraving work really
only consisted of adding the odd value to a stamp.
In 1951, Ronald retired, spending his retirement years
dedicated to his favourite hobby photography. Even though the Harrison involvement
in stamp production ended with him, he had been telling so many enthusiastic
stamp stories to his grandson Joe, that the latter became a philatelist who
ended up being a Council member of the Royal Philatelic Society of Victoria!
You will find Ronald A Harrison's database HERE.