Ronald Dare Gillespie was born in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada in April 1890 and was educated at Loretto School, Edinburgh He received his training in Edinburgh but returned to British Columbia to practise engineering and surveying.
Gillespie then served in the British Raw Materials Mission in Washington until the war ended.
In April 1946, he was nominated as the Chamber of Commerce's representative in the Legislative Council of Hong Kong and served until 1948.
[1] During his service in the Legislative Council, he was appointed member of the eleven-member Taxation Committee in 1946 which chaired by the Financial Secretary C. G. S. Follows to discuss the controversial issue of introducing new tax.
Gillespie believed that an income tax was the best form of taxation "provided it was equitably collected."