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{{Infobox person
| name = William Asbury Porter, Jr.
| image =
| birth_date = {{birth date|1928|11|10}}
| birth_place = [[Boulder, Colorado]], US
| death_date = {{death date and age|2015|10|15|1928|11|10}}
| death_place = [[Kilauea, Hawaii]], US
| alma_mater = [[Adams State College]]<br/>[[Kansas State University]]<br/>[[Massachusetts Institute of Technology]]
| known_for = Founder of [[E-Trade]]
| spouse = {{married|Ava Guthrie||1974|end=div}}<br />{{married|Joan|1990}}
| children = 3
}}
'''William A. Porter''' (1928–2015) was an American businessperson who, along with [[Bernard A. Newcomb]] founded the first [[electronic trading platform]], [[E-Trade]].<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.boston.com/news/education/higher/specials/mit150/mitlist/?page=full|title=The MIT 150: 150 Ideas, Inventions, and Innovators that Helped Shape Our World|publisher=[[The Boston Globe]]|date=May 15, 2011|accessdate=August 8, 2011}}</ref><ref name="nyt 2">{{cite news|url= http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/02/04/does-this-town-still-know-how-to-give-a-victory-parade/| title= Does This Town Still Know How to Give a Victory Parade?|publisher=The New York Times, City Room, By Jennifer Lee, Feb 4, 2008 | date=February 4, 2008}}</ref>
He received his [[B.A.]] from [[Adams State College]], an [[M.S.]] in Physics from [[Kansas State University]], and his Master's in Management from the [[Sloan Fellows]] program at the [[MIT Sloan School of Management]].▼
After the success of [[E-Trade]], Porter also co-founded [[International Securities Exchange]] with Marty Averbuch <ref name="ise.com">{{cite web | url= http://www.ise.com/WebForm/viewPage.aspx?categoryId=141&header5=true&menu0=true&link0=true| title= ISE History of Leadership| publisher=ISE.com}}</ref> and became the first chairman of ISE on his 70th birthday in 1998.<ref name="standard.com">{{cite web | url= http://www.thestandard.com/article/0,1902,2471,00.html| title= E-Trade Founder Unveils Electronic Options Exchange| publisher=TheStandard.com, Megan Barnett, November 10, 1998}}</ref> Porter was the former chief executive officer, board member, and chairman emeritus of [[E-Trade]].
In 2000, [[CNN]] called Porter the "forefather of online trading".<ref name="cnn">{{cite news|url= http://edition.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0002/06/pin.00.html|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20011112081821/http://edition.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0002/06/pin.00.html|url-status= dead|archive-date= November 12, 2001| title= Pinnacle William Porter: Forefather of Online Trading|publisher=CNN.com, Pinnacle, aired February 6, 2000 }}</ref>
[[Category:MIT Sloan School of Management alumni|Porter]]▼
Later in his life he donated money to businesses and nonprofits benefiting organic farming, recreation and community building on Kauai's North Shore.
[[Category:Chief executives|Porter, William]]▼
[[Category:Sloan Fellows]]▼
==Background==
Porter was born to William Asbury Porter Sr.(1899-1965) and Dorothy Louise Bullock Porter (1905-1980).<ref name="obit2">{{cite web
|title = William Asbury Porter
|publisher = Geni.com
|author =
|date =
|url = https://www.geni.com/people/William-A-Porter/6000000179057976821/}}</ref> He was raised in Boulder, Colorado,<ref name="spectrum">{{cite web|url= http://spectrum.mit.edu/issue/2000-winter/a-significant-gift/|title= A Significant Gift | publisher=Spectrum M.I.T.}}</ref><ref name="Physics at KState">{{cite web|url= http://www.phys.ksu.edu/alumni/nichols-lectures/2002/porter.html| title= 2002 Ernest Fox Nichols Lecture, Applying Physics for the Betterment of Humankind|publisher=Physics at KState, September 20, 2002}}</ref> and spent his childhood summers as a cowboy on a Colorado ranch.<ref name="cnn"/> Porter quit high school to join the Navy during WWII and was expelled from the Navy when they learned he was only sixteen. Porter later put himself through college, finishing undergraduate work in three years <ref name="adams.edu 2">{{cite web | url= http://www2.adams.edu/alumni/billy_adams/billy_adams.php| title= Adams Billy Adams Award, 2005, William Porter| publisher=Adams State College}}</ref> and working nights as a crew dispatcher on the [[Denver and Rio Grande|Denver and Rio Grande Railroad]].<ref name="cnn"/><ref name="adams.edu">{{cite web | url= http://www.adams.edu/news/may0715/may0715.php| title= Adams State alumnus gives $5.8 million for science and math scholarships| publisher=Adams State College, May 17, 2007}}</ref> According to a 2000 [[CNN]] interview, Porter attributes his self-confidence to his work as a young cowboy:
{{quote|Hard, hard work. I used to get up at four o'clock in the morning and it was my job to go out and get the horses in and so forth and come in and eat and sit on a horse all day long. And when we weren't doing that, we were, you know, stacking hay or mowing the oats or, you know, whatever. When you're in the homesteading frame of mind you just do things because they're right and you have that self-confidence that just won't quit.}}
As a student at Adams State College, Porter and other students would take turns visiting and reading aloud to the aged and infirmed former governor of Colorado, [[Billy Adams (politician)|Billy Adams]].<ref name="adams.edu 2"/>
===Education===
▲
==Career==
===First Company===
Porter started Commercial Electronics Inc. in 1968 <ref name="adams.edu 2"/> and developed the first commercial low-light [[night vision]] for electron microscopes <ref name="adams.edu 2"/> and the first color low-light ([[night vision]]) broadcast television camera, a technology that's used today in all broadcast cameras. Porter sold Commercial Electronics to Warner Communications after the cancellation of a large order during the 1974 recession.<ref name="cnn"/><ref name="MIT">{{cite web |url= http://entrepreneurship.mit.edu/legendary_leaders_memorials.php#Porter| title= Legendary Leaders and Memorials, William A. Porter '67 Founder of Online Brokerages | publisher=MIT Entrepreneurship Center}}</ref>
===Patents===
Porter holds 14 patents, having developed a number of electronic devices and processes—including for the aforementioned "first" shoulder-mounted-backpack broadcast color TV camera, the first infrared horizon sensor for satellite stabilization (prior to Sputnik),<ref name="cnn"/> and several other breakthroughs still in use today in a variety of fields—including, according to the 2000 CNN interview, devices used by the US military to this day.<ref name="cnn"/>
===The Search===
Under the project name ''The Search'', Porter developed the first electronic diesel-electric locomotive "checkout
system," whereby a testing device could be inserted into a locomotive engine. The Southern Pacific and B&O Railroads suggested the system could improve operating capacity of the approximately 33,000 locomotive engines in the US by roughly 10 percent.<ref name="cnn"/>
===Management and Directorships===
Porter has served as Chairman of Trelleborg Rubber Company, President of Tretorn Shoes, and President of Commercial Electronics Incorporated (see below). Porter was Director of Research and Planning for Textron from 1962–67, and Research Manager and Electrical Engineer of [[General Electric]]'s Advanced Electronics Center at [[Cornell University]] from 1957–62. He was a physicist with the National Bureau of Standards from 1952–1957.<ref name="adams.edu 2"/>
==Creation of E-Trade==
In 1980, in [[Palo Alto, California|Palo Alto]], Porter met Bernie Newcomb at a party.<ref name="afb">{{cite web|url=http://www.afb.org/Section.asp?SectionID=41&TopicID=230&DocumentID=2050|title=Bernard A. Newcomb Donor Profile|publisher=American Foundation for the Blind}}</ref> Having recently purchased an [[Apple II]] computer, Porter had the idea that a personal computer could be used to buy and sell stock. Having no means of accessing the necessary information with his modem, Porter convinced Newcomb to become his partner and together create a company that would enable any individual with a personal computer to trade stocks from their home—thereby [[Disintermediation|disintermediating]] stock trades. Newcomb developed the programming which enabled the project to succeed.
According to Porter, the first actual trade, made on July 11, 1983,<ref name="spectrum" /> was made by a dentist in Michigan.<ref name="cnn" />
In 1992, ''[[PC Magazine]]'' featured Trade*Plus on its cover. In 1992, The ''San Jose Business Journal'' named Trade*Plus the year's fastest growing private company in Silicon Valley.<ref name="afb" /> In 1996, Trade*Plus was renamed E-Trade Group and went public. Newcomb retired soon after and established a philanthropic foundation, the Bernard A. Newcomb Foundation.
==Personal life and philanthropy==
Porter had three children from his first wife, Ada Guthrie,<ref name="adams.edu 2">{{cite web | url= http://www2.adams.edu/alumni/billy_adams/billy_adams.php| title= Adams Billy Adams Award, 2005, William Porter| publisher=Adams State College}}</ref> now deceased. He and his second wife Joan, who has one child from a previous marriage,<ref name="cnn"/> had homes in [[Portola Valley, California]], and [[Princeville, Hawaii]].<ref name="phys.ksu">{{cite web |url= http://www.phys.ksu.edu/news/2007/porter-endowment.html |title= William and Joan Porter Professor of Physics| publisher=Physics @ K State}}</ref> Together, the Porters had ten grandchildren.<ref name="mitcnc">{{cite web | url= http://www.mitcnc.org/Newsletters/99-Winter.pdf| title= E-Business Entrepreneur William Porter G'67 Donates $25M To Sloan |publisher=MIT Club of Northern California}}</ref> Joan Porter was the founder and president of the Stillheart Institute in Woodside, CA (2003-2014).<ref name="stillheart">{{cite web | title = The Stillheart Institute, Team | publisher = Stillheart.net | url=http://www.stillheart.net/index.php/stillheart-institute/staff}}</ref>
In 1999, Porter and his wife Joan gave $25 million to the [[MIT Sloan School of Management]].<ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/stories/1999/10/25/daily27.html| title=Porter gives $25M to MIT | work=[[American City Business Journals]] | date=October 28, 1999}}</ref><ref>{{cite press release | url=https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20070430006334/en/MIT-Sloan-Groundbreaking-Ceremony-Unveil-Plans-New | title=MIT Sloan Groundbreaking Ceremony to Unveil Plans for New Eastern ''Gateway'' | publisher=[[Business Wire]] | date=April 30, 2007}}</ref>
{{quote|My wife and I decided to give one major thing that would have significant meaning for humankind, and trying to leverage the Institute's technological capability through entrepreneurship for the betterment of the human condition is it.}}
In 2007, the Porters gave 250,000 shares of E-Trade stock to [[Adams State College]] (worth approximately $5.8 million at the time), the largest gift in school's history.<ref name="adams.edu"/>
Porter died October 15, 2015, at home in Princeville, Hawaii.<ref>{{Cite web|title = He was for the community|url = http://thegardenisland.com/news/local/he-was-for-the-community/article_b0189309-bb74-5fa5-bd04-5a0ac9816916.html?mode=image&photo=0|website = Thegardenisland.com|accessdate = 2015-10-17}}</ref><ref name="obit">{{cite web
|title = Legacy of William A. Porter lives on through Porter Scholars Program
|publisher = Adams State University
|author =
|date = December 1, 2016
|url = https://www.adams.edu/news/legacy-of-william-a-porter-lives-on-through-porter-scholars-program/}}</ref>
==References==
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▲[[Category:MIT Sloan Fellows]]
[[Category:Adams State University alumni]]
[[Category:1928 births]]
[[Category:2015 deaths]]
[[Category:People from Portola Valley, California]]
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