Little is known about Robert Eldridge Cromartie. In 1929, he was born in Cross Creek, Cumberland County, North Carolina and his family took part in the Great Migration, settling in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Cromartie had been painting and drawing since childhood and as a youth took classes at the School Art League in Philadelphia. He received formal training, but never finishing his degree, at the Tyler School of Fine Arts at Temple University and at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. He enlisted in the United States Army in 1951 and was honorably discharged in 1953. According to his obituary, he worked as a USPS postal worker and later opened Cromartie Awards, a plaque and trophy business that allowed him to continue his artistic practice.