Robert Crannell Minor (1839–1904), American artist, was born in New York City on April 30, 1839.

His father, Israel Minor, was a merchant who made a large fortune in the pharmaceutical business.

He visited various galleries in England before traveling to Barbizon, France, where he studied under Diaz.

In 1900, Minor achieved the height of his success at the historic William T. Evans sale in 1900, where his painting The Close of Day (private collection) fetched $3,050, the highest price for a landscape by a living American painter at that auction.

His paintings are characteristic of the Barbizon school and Tonalism, and he was particularly happy in his sunset and twilight effects; but it was only within a few years of his death that he began to have a vogue among collectors.