Covering new ground

Orkney Library and Archive. D156/0136

This is Sarah Hooking with her turkeys.

It took me a while to see that there are no feet on the ground in this picture!

This is one of my favourite Beatrice Garvie images, among the many that capture moments of island life on North Ronaldsay in the 1930s and '40s. Her technique is so natural that it's easy to forget how unusual that was at the time, when posed shots, to suit the photographer's parameters, were standard.

There was something else very unusual about her practice too: Island families remember that Dr Garvie would always make copies of her photographs to give to the people in them, during the sixteen years that she was also their doctor.

Orkney Library and Archive. D156/0066

Here is another of my favourite shots. If you look closely you can see droplets of seawater spraying from the flung rope.