The E-Sylum:  Volume 10, Number 17, April 29, 2007, Article 23

ARTICLE: CANADIAN BANKNOTE DESIGNER LESLEY SAWYER DIES

Also today The Gazette of Montreal published a nice obituary of Lesley 
Sawyer, an artist responsible for a number of Canadian currency designs.

"Leslie Sawyer had designs on a lot of money. But he never became rich.

"The British-born graphic artist responsible for the Scenes of Canada 
series of Canadian banknotes that were issued in the 1970s, died April 
15 of congestive heart failure in the Lakeshore General Hospital. He was 86.

"As a child, he displayed a natural talent for drawing and at 14 dropped 
out of school to apprentice as a commercial artist.

"At 19, he joined the Royal Air Force and during the Second World War 
served with 112 Squadron as ground crew in the North African Campaign 
painting the shark's faces on Tomahawk aircraft.

"When the war ended, he went to work in London as a designer for the 
De La Rue Company Ltd., described as the world's largest security 
printer, which began printing currency for the British Treasury in 1914.

"As a house artist, he was responsible for the design on the back of the 
$5 bill in the 1954 series of Canadian currency that introduced the 
queen's portrait on Canadian money for the first time.

"In the 1970s, he designed the series of Canadian banknotes that 
featured multicoloured security tints to the basic hues of the bank 
notes."

To read the complete article, see: Full Story

  Wayne Homren, Editor

	coinbooks.org Web

The Numismatic Bibliomania Society is a non-profit organization 
promoting numismatic literature. See our web site at coinbooks.org.

To submit items for publication in The E-Sylum, write to the Editor 
at this address: whomren@coinlibrary.com

To subscribe go to: https://my.binhost.com/lists/listinfo/esylum