James Clerk Maxwell: Science, Gardeners, and the First Color Photograph

May 17, 1861

James Clerk Maxwell, the prodigious Scottish scientist who captured the very first color photograph on this day, unveiling a tartan ribbon to the Royal Institution in London—a modest image that brightened the history of science forever.

Maxwell, known for formulating the classical theory of electromagnetic radiation, stood not only among great minds but also inspired even Albert Einstein himself, who famously corrected a colleague’s claim of standing on Newton’s shoulders by declaring,

“No, I don't. I stand on the shoulders of Maxwell.”

But Maxwell’s genius thrived not only in abstract theories. In a charming letter to his friend William Thompson in 1879, titled Peacocks as Gardeners, Maxwell revealed a delightful glimpse into the life at his Ardhallow garden:

“We got our original stock from Mrs McCunn, Ardhallow.
At that time (1860), the garden there was the finest on the coast and the peacocks sat on the parapets & banks near the house.

Mr. McCunn was very fond of his garden and very particular about it, but he also cared for his peacocks...
Whenever he went out, he had bits of bread and such for them.

Mrs. Maxwell (my wife) always gets the peacocks to choose the gardener and they have chosen one who has now been seven years with us.

At seed time (in the garden) they are confined in a [little house] where they have some Indian corn and water. When the hen is sitting, she is not [confined], for she keeps to her nest and nobody is supposed to know where that is, but she comes once a day to the house and calls for her dinner and eats it and goes back to her nest at once.

The peacocks will eat the young cabbages, but the gardener tells them to go...

They find it pleasanter to be about the house and to sit on either side of the front door.”

Maxwell, ever the thoughtful scholar, also likened academia’s collaborative spirit to that of the busy bee, writing:

“In a University we are especially bound to recognise not only the unity of science itself, but the communion of the workers in science. We are too apt to suppose that we are congregated here merely to be within reach of certain appliances of study, such as museums and laboratories, libraries and lecturers, so that each of us may study what he prefers.

I suppose that when the bees crowd round the flowers it is for the sake of the honey that they do so, never thinking that it is the dust which they are carrying from flower to flower which is to render possible a more splendid array of flowers, and a busier crowd of bees, in the years to come.

We cannot, therefore, do better than improve the shining hour in helping forward the cross-fertilization of the sciences.”

Isn't that an exquisite metaphor for legacy and growth?

On a personal note, I assembled my roster of student gardeners for 2021 this past week. Each summer session concludes with a ten-minute photography exercise, where young hands capture spectacular color images on their phones—with airdrop making sharing effortless. James Clerk Maxwell would surely delight in the vibrant new legacy they cultivate.

Consider this, dear reader: the typical teenager’s camera roll is often filled with selfies, memes, and the usual bustle of friendships. Yet after a summer in the garden, these young gardeners possess hundreds of photographs of nature’s wonders—flowers, landscapes, leaves, stones, water droplets, insects, and even my loyal companion Sonny.

How do we inspire a new generation of horticulturists?

We must transform what they see every day.

We must get flowers on their phones.