Snowflake Bentley by Jacqueline Briggs Martin

 

Title: Snowflake Bentley
Genre: Non Fiction

Author: Jacqueline Briggs Martin

Illustrator: Mary Azarian

Major Awards: Caldecott Award

Age group: 4th-6th

Summary

This story is a biography about the man nicknamed snowflake Bentley because he was the first man to photograph actual individual snow crystals.  willy had always been fascinated by snow and one day he notices how beautiful the individual crystal were.  He spent three winters trying to draw each crystal but they melted so quickly.  when he was sixteen he begged his family for a camera in order to effectively capture the crystal and share them with others.  At the age of seventeen Willy finally received his wish and got the most expensive camera out on the market from his parents.  The first images were busts and nothing more than shadows but he would not give up.  He worked through very storm and finally during the second winter he figured out how to photograph snowflakes!  However not many people were as excited as he.  But that did not stop him he continued making photos through the long and extraneous process.  Willy then put on slideshows of all his pictures for the neighborhood and from there colleges purchased his photos and added them to their collections, art designers used his ideas to create, finally at age 66 he published all the great pictures he'd taken.  Unfortunately he would go out into a snowstorm that following winter and get sick with pneumonia and pass two weeks after that.  Willy never expected any money all he wanted everyone to see was the beauty of the snow and that was the legacy he left behind.

Evaluation

I found this story to be so interesting.  when people read biographies they are usually over more well known individuals like athletes or musicians or scientists.  I think Snowflake Bentley was one of a kind and I loved reading his story.  I feel like this would be a good introductory biography for older elementary school students because it uses bigger vocabulary but is not too daunting.  I might consider using this in the classroom if I were teaching 6th or 7th graders who needed something unique in order to understand the beauty of a biography.