In 1809 a New York portrait painter stunned the world with a great invention what was this and his name?

Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre was the inventor of the "Daguerreotype" which was the first practical process of photography.

http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/bldaguerreotype.htm

Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre was a French artist and scientist, not a New Yorker. See here for more information and here for even more links.

Yep dg, I knew he was French but skipped right over the New York reference in the question. Good catch.

That's why I get the big bucks, Kwll.