This head-and-shoulders portrait of Morse is a daguerreotype made between 1844 and 1860 from the studio of Mathew B. Brady. Morse, considered one of the finest portrait painters in America of the Romantic Style, had studied art in Paris, where he met Daguerre. Upon returning to the U.S., Morse set up his own photographic studio. He was among the first in America to make portraits using the new daguerrotype method. It has been claimed that this portrait of Morse may be the first daguerreotype made in America. If not the first, it is among the earliest.