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| Ordinary dendritic ice crystal |
The Schwerdtfeger Library has a new exhibit on display in the third floor hallway. Just in time for the winter season, we are featuring eight different examples of types of ice crystals from Wilson A. Bentley’s collection of photomicrographs.
Known as America’s first cloud physicist, Wilson Bentley had
a lifelong passion for studying and observing water in all of its forms -- dew,
frost, clouds, rain, and snowflakes. But, 'always, from the very beginning, it
was snowflakes that fascinated [him] most.' (Blanchard, 262).
Bentley graduated from observing and drawing snowflakes to
taking photographs through a microscope, obtaining the first photomicrograph
ever taken of an ice crystal on January 15, 1885. (A snowflake is usually
composed of many ice crystals that collide and stick together as they fall. But
with persistence, one can find and isolate individual ice crystals.) He
obtained thousands of photomicrographs of individual ice crystals over the
course of his lifetime.
Stop by the exhibit just outside room 317 for a closer look,
and be sure to browse through our digitized collection at http://library.ssec.wisc.edu/bentley/search.php?job=search.
(Source:
Blanchard, Duncan C., 1970. Wilson Bentley, The Snowflake Man.Weatherwise v.23
(6), pp260-269.)