Russell W. Porter
Russell Williams Porter (December 13, 1871 – February 22, 1949) was an American artist, engineer, amateur astronomer and explorer. He was a pioneer in the field of “cutaway illustration" and is sometimes referred to as the "founder" or one of the "founders" of amateur telescope making."
Russell W. Porter, the youngest of five children, was born in 1871 Springfield, Vermont. His parents were Frederick and Caroline Porter. Russell showed an early aptitude for art. He graduated from Vermont Academy in 1891 and went on to study engineering at Norwich University and at the University of Vermont and later studied architecture and art at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Porter became interested in the arctic when he attended Robert Peary's lectures on Greenland in 1892. He signed up to sail on the ship Miranda as surveyor and artist for Frederick Cook's voyage to Greenland that next year. The voyage ended with the ship colliding with an iceberg and the crew being rescued by Inuit. Porter continued travel to the arctic with Peary and Greenland again in 1896, to Baffin Island in 1897, with the Yukon gold rush in 1898, to Labrador in 1899, and northern Greenland in 1900. Porter was a in charge of astronomical observations on the Ziegler Polar Expeditions financed by New York businessman William Ziegler in 1901 and 1903. The second expedition was stranded in the arctic for 3 years when their ship, the Steam Yacht America, was crushed by the ice and sank in Teplitz Bay off Rudolf Island in the Russian arctic. In 1906 Porter again joined Frederick Cook in an expedition to Alaska’s Mount McKinley. Porter’s party surveyed a 3,000-square-mile (7,800 km2) region around the mountain (including painting a watercolor of the mountain) while Cook’s party broke off to climb the mountain. When the parties rendezvoused, Porter was skeptical of Cook's claims that he climbed the mountain.
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