Charles Ethan Porter (1840 - 1923), African American,still life,painter.

Porter was born in 1847 or 1848 in either Hartford, East Hartford, or Rockville, Connecticut. In 1857, his father built a house in Rockville. He graduated from Rockville High School in 1865. Porter went on to study at the New York's National Academy of Design. In 1878, he opened a studio in Hartford. When he traveled to Europe, several years later, he took with him a letter of recommendation from Mark Twain. Porter returned to the U.S. and worked in Hartford and New York before returning to Rockville in 1889. He had a studio in the Fitch Block and at the Tower on Fox Hill . Later, his fortunes declined and he sold his paintings door-to-door trading the paintings for food or flowers to paint. He died in Rockville in 1923. Porter is remembered as the creator of minor masterpieces of American still life painting. One of his pupils, Gustave Adolph Hoffman , became more famous.