Arthur Porter (historian)

Arthur Thomas Daniel Porter III (26 January 1924 – 26 March 2019) was a Creole professor, historian, and author. His book on the Sierra Leone Creole people, Creoledom: A study of the development of Freetown society, examines their society in a way in which few books of their time period had, and it is one of the most quoted books on the Creoles. He was also published in East Africa and the UK.

Professor

Arthur Porter
BornArthur Thomas Daniel Porter III
(1924-10-27)27 October 1924
Freetown, British Sierra Leone
Died26 March 2019(2019-03-26) (aged 95)
Ottawa, Canada
OccupationHistorian, sociologist
NationalityBritish Subject, Sierra Leonean
EducationUniversity of Cambridge, Boston College

Early life

Arthur Porter was born in January 1924 in Freetown, British Sierra Leone, to Guy Hardesty Porter and Adelina Porter. Guy Porter was an electrical engineer who died as a civil servant. Adelina Porter was a school teacher at the Freetown Secondary School for Girls, which was attended by Porter's sister, Iyatunde Harriet Maria Palmer (née Porter). Porter attended the Cathedral School in Freetown.

Background

Like many Creoles, Porter is of West Indian, Jamaican Maroon, Liberated African, and Nova Scotian settler descent. His paternal grandfather was Arthur Thomas Porter I (1834–1908), a successful Creole businessman of West Indian and Jamaican Maroon parentage. The father of A. T. Porter I was Guy Porter, a West Indian immigrant to Sierra Leone via England, who became a headman of Kent Village. Guy Porter married a Maroon colonist. The Porter family house owned by A. T. Porter I was at No. 11 Wilberforce Street in the heart of Settler Town and near Zion Methodist Church.

Porter was also of "Settler" or Nova Scotian stock, by way of a Virginian ancestor who had arrived in Sierra Leone via Nova Scotia. The Virginian had occupied a house in what the Nova Scotians called Settler Town, Sierra Leone, and was one of the founders of Freetown. He is a graduate of the Cambridge School of Clinical Medicine in Cambridge, England.[1]

Personal life

Porter married a woman from Denmark and had two children, Arthur and Emma. He was the grandfather of four girls: Gemma, Fiona, Adina and Charlotte. He lives in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, and he makes frequent trips back to his homeland, Sierra Leone. Porter's son, Arthur Porter IV, was a Canadian physician and former Director General (CEO) of the McGill University Health Centre.

Porter died on 26 March in Ottawa, Canada.[2]

Legacy

Porter's work on Sierra Leonean history is considered to be among the most scholarly work done on the people of his native Sierra Leone. Porter's analysis of the stratification of Creole society is considered the most authoritative work on the development of Creole society, and most scholars reference his book when researching the Creole people. The work he accomplished during his tenure at Fourah Bay College has made many look upon Porter as one in the mould of historian Christopher Fyfe, Professor Eldred D. Jones, Professor Akintola J. G. Wyse, and linguist Leo Spitzer.

After leaving his post as Vice-Principal of Fourah Bay College, Porter moved to East Africa and became Principal of the University College, Nairobi, one of the three colleges of the University of East Africa. His term there ended in 1970.[3][4]

Sources
  1. "Hon. Dr. Arthur T. Porter, P.C., M.D.", MUHC Foundation.
  2. "PORTER, Arthur Thomas". OttawaMatters.com. Archived from the original on 2 April 2019. Retrieved 9 April 2019.
  3. "Proceedings & Papers of the International Conference on African Bibliography, Nairobi, 4-8 Dec. 1967", Patterson, J. D. and Jones, R. (eds). NY: Africana Publishing Corp., 1970.
  4. Headway, Volume 3, Number 1; "Turning Point 1963: Looking back on the birth of a Kenyan medical school". McGill Publications, McGill University, Canada. Retrieved 13 February 2012. Archived 29 November 2014 at the Wayback Machine
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