cp0214huntington

photo courtesy of Samuel Huntington Historical Trust
This portrait was painted in 1783 by Charles Wilson Peale, when Samuel Huntington was 52. It’s the only known portrait of Samuel Huntington. It hangs in the Charles Wilson Peale Gallery in Philadelphia. Samuel Huntington, it can be argued, was this first president of the United States. This is because Huntington was president of the Continental Congress when the Articles of Confederation were ratified on March 1, 1781, the document that created the new nation –– officially known at the time as the United States of Congress Assembled.