"The Man Who Revealed the Hidden Structure of Falling Snowflakes"







  • A numinous fact, as basic to childhood as George Washington’s cherry tree confession (and far more reliable), is that no two snowflakes are exactly alike. 
  • Almost as incredible...is that one individual is responsible for this...revelation, a man as deserving of a place in that pantheon of those who have revealed something we never knew before as Copernicus, Newton and Curie. 
  • Let us add his name to the list: Wilson A. Bentley.
  • Beginning in the early 1880s, Bentley...[devised] a mechanism that combined a microscope with a view camera. Using light-sensitive glass plates not unlike those that had recorded Civil War battlefields, he learned how to make extraordinarily sophisticated “portraits” of individual snow crystals.
  • Isolating individual crystals itself posed a daunting challenge—there may be 200 of them in a large snowflake. And keeping the crystals frozen and unspoiled required Bentley to work outside, using balky equipment. 
  • Bentley seemed willing to pursue his arduous work—over the years he made pictures of thousands of snow crystals—not with any hope for financial gain but simply for the joy of discovery. 
  • Nicknamed Snowflake by his neighbors, he claimed his pictures were “evidence of God’s wonderful plan” and considered the endlessly varied crystals “miracles of beauty.”
  • In 1904, Bentley approached the Smithsonian with nearly 20 years of photographs and a manuscript describing his methods and findings. But...the submission [was rejected] as “unscientific.” (Eventually, the U.S. Weather Bureau published the manuscript and many of the photographs.)
  • Avowing that “it seemed a shame” not to share the wonders he had recorded, Bentley sold many of his glass plates to schools and colleges for 5 cents apiece. He never copyrighted his work.
  • Bentley’s efforts to document the artistry of winter garnered him attention as he grew older. He published an article in National Geographic. Finally, in 1931, he collaborated with meteorologist William J. Humphreys on a book, Snow Crystals, illustrated with 2,500 of Snowflake’s snowflakes
  • Bentley’s long, frigid labors culminated just in the nick of time. The man who revealed the glittering secret of every white Christmas died that same year on December 23 at his Jericho farm.

    Read the full profile (by Owen Edwards) here. See the book here