Richard Edward Jennings was born in Hampstead, London, on 20 May 1921. He won a free scholarship to the Central School of Arts in 1937, but his studies were interrupted by the outbreak of the Second World War. He served in the Air/Sea Rescue service of the RAF in the Middle East. He took a variety of jobs after demobilisation, including fishing and decorating pubs and hotels for a brewery in Devon, before moving to London in 1950 and getting work on the newly launched Eagle.