Born in Connellsville, Pennsylvania, in 1870 and died in 1941, Edwin S. Porter worked as a projectionist and mechanic before joining Edison's company in 1900. He learned from the trick films of Méliès and the British Brighton school, and in Life of an American Fireman and The Great Train Robbery (1903) he developed cross-cutting between separate lines of action and a continuous narrative. The Great Train Robbery was a huge popular hit and helped create the western. He later co-founded the Rex and Famous Players companies, and lost his fortune in the 1929 crash.
Filmography
- Life of an American Fireman (1903)
- The Great Train Robbery (1903)
- The Kleptomaniac (1905)
- The "Teddy" Bears (1907)