In the opening scene of the 1941 mystery Citizen Kane, the eponymous protagonist, played by Orson Welles, clenches a snow globe in his hand as he utters his last word: “rosebud.” The glass-encased ...

Erwin Perzy I, a surgical instruments mechanic in Vienna, was experimenting with a water-filled glass globe around 1900 to amplify light when added particles drifted down like snow. The "snowfall" ...