This Is What The First Photographs Of Snowflakes Looked Like

Gorgeous photomicrographs from 1890.

Wilson A. Bentley is the guy you can thank for the phrase "special snowflake."

The self-educated farmer was born in Jericho, Vermont in 1865 and had a lifelong love of snow. According to the Jericho Historical Society, he spent more than a year experimenting with different ways of taking photographs through a microscope. And in 1885, he became the first person to successfully photograph a single crystal of snow.

library.ssec.wisc.edu

Here is a collection of his snowflake photographs from 1890...

Wilson A. Bentley / Via dp.la

Wilson Bentley / Via dp.la

Wilson A. Bentley / Via dp.la

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