It’s the default wallpaper on Windows XP. Green rolling hills, bright blue sky, a few thin clouds.
For two decades, most people assumed it was a computer-generated image or something digitally painted. It wasn’t.
In January 1996, a former National Geographic photographer named Charles O’Rear was driving through the countryside in California, USA, to visit his girlfriend.
A storm had just passed. The winter rains had made the grass unusually green. He noticed a hill on the side of the road that had recently been cleared of grapevines because of a pest infestation.
He pulled over, set up his camera on a tripod, took a few pictures, and kept driving. It wasn’t edited. No Photoshop. No colour enhancement. That’s what the hill actually looked like.
He sold it to a stock photo agency for a modest fee. Years later, Microsoft bought the full rights for somewhere in the low six figures.
Getting the original film to Microsoft was the strange part. The package was worth so much that not a single courier company would ship it.
They all refused. Microsoft eventually bought Charles a plane ticket and had him hand-deliver the film himself.
They renamed the photo “Bliss.” Windows XP launched in 2001. Within a few years, it was on nearly every computer on earth.
Journalists now speculate it may be the most-viewed photograph in human history.
The hill is still there. Grapevines grew back over it years ago.
Every so often, someone drives past and catches it when the vines have been cleared for the season, and for a few days, it looks exactly like the picture again.
Charles is now 84 years old
Credit: @DoctorLemma (X)
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