Biography

Edwin S. Porter

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In the late 1890s Porter worked as both a projectionist and mechanic, eventually becoming director and cameraman for the Edison Manufacturing Company. Influenced by both the "Brighton school" and the story films of Georges Méliès, Porter went on to make important shorts such as Life of an American Fireman (1903) and The Great Train Robbery (1903). In them, he helped to develop the modern concept of continuity editing, paving the way for D.W. Griffith who would expand on Porter's discovery that the unit of film structure was the shot rather than the scene. Porter, in an attempt to resist the new industrial system born out of the popularity of nickelodeons, left Edison in 1909 to form his own production company which he eventually sold in 1912.
- IMDb mini biography by: Michael Kaminsky <kaminsky@ucsee.eecs.berkeley.edu>

Co-founded (w/William Swanson, Joseph W. Engel) Rex Film Co., formed in 1909.
He has directed four films that have been selected for the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically or aesthetically" significant: Life of an American Fireman (1903), The Great Train Robbery (1903), Dream of a Rarebit Fiend (1906) and Tess of the Storm Country (1914).
Biography in: John Wakeman, editor. "World Film Directors, Volume One, 1890-1945". Pages 870-881. New York: The H.W. Wilson Company, 1987.
As chief director and cameraman for the Edison Studio, Porter's top salary was $85 a week. As an independent producer (after 1909) and developer of the Simplex movie projector, he eventually became a millionaire.
Porter withdrew from movie-making in 1915. He sold his share of Famous Players to Adolph Zukor for $800,000 and became president of the Precision Machine Co., manufacturer of the Simplex movie projectors. He was well-off enough to retire at 55 in 1925, but lost much of his fortune in the 1929 Wall Street crash.

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