Harold Llewellyn Sheard born 17th October 1890 in Gawler, South Australia. Parents Alfred and Mary Clementine Sheard (nee Farmer), married 31st August 1885.
Harold Sheard married Rose Hilda Lowcay 17th August 1915, Manthorpe Memorial Church, Unley.
They had two children:
- Betty Margaret Sheard born 7th May 1917
- Lauri Edwin Sheard born 9th March 1922
Harold Sheard met Charles Mountford when they both attended the first meeting of the Anthropological Society of South Australia in 1926, and became foundation members.
Sheard shared Mountford’s quickening interest in ethnology and joined him on weekend excursions searching for evidence of Aboriginal people.
These were the years of Mountford’s employment with the Post Office. Sheard...was a storekeeper at Gawler, but a few years later he took over a run-down General business at Nuriootpa and built it up. (Lamshed, pp 213)
Sheard researched and wrote in the field of anthropology and was published in the Transactions of the Royal Society of South Australia.
Sheard’s son Lauri accompanied Mountford on the expedition to the Western Desert in 1940, aged 18. Lauri Sheard was lost over New Guinea in 1945 serving with the R.A.A.F.
When Mountford returned from the Arnhem Land expedition, he sought out his friend Sheard now living at Port Elliot. Sheard, worried that Mountford was sorting through and throwing away expedition material, told Mountford he would look after it. He gradually took over and collated everything Mountford had to hand and created the Sheard Collection which would later be presented to the Public Library of South Australia in 1957.
Harold Sheard retired to Port Elliot. During the 1950s and 1960s he was a member of and wrote for the Port Elliot Publicity Committee.