Postcard from Johanna Kissling to her children

  Postcard from Johanna Kissling to her children, Western Isles, 1905   This is a postcard sent by Johanna Kissling to her children from the Scottish Western Isles in 1905.   It shows a young woman carrying peat in a woven basket slung over her back. As well as buying postcards, Johanna Kissling took her own photographs on St Kilda.   Johanna Kissling liked to travel and Dr Kissling took after her. Twenty years after this postcard was sent he began his own research in the Western Isles, taking his mother's postcard with him.   Some of the photographs Dr Kissling took in the Western Isles, including similar scenes of peat-carrying can be seen here.   Dr Werner Kissling (1895-1988) was a German photographer and ethnographer who spent most of his life documenting Scottish crafts, architecture, and agricultural practices. He was associated with Dumfries Museum from the mid-1950s until his death in 1988.