Photographic Postcards of Kansas

Collection of photographic postcards collected by Michael D. Heaston and created by professional, itinerant, and amateur photographers that document more than 600 cities, towns, and communities in Kansas, 1901-1953. Significant quantities of postcards exist for Concordia, Hutchinson, Larned, Wichita, and Winfield.

The postcards record natural landscapes of Kansas, including the Great Plains in the western region as well as hills and forests in the eastern region, and cultural landscapes of settlements including commercial buildings, homes, agricultural activities, and street scenes. Events documented include fires, floods, railroad accidents, snowstorms, and tornadoes as well as cultural activities such as concerts, fairs, parades, sports, and theatrical productions. Particularly well represented in the collection are images related to horse-drawn and automobile transportation. Scattered examples of "exaggeration" postcards have imagery that facetiously underscore aspects of a place, such as a man riding an enormous grasshopper.

The guide to the collection documents more than seventy photographers and publishers identified by manuscript inscriptions in images and printed credits on postcards. Photographers with significant quantities of postcards in the collection include John Bowers of Topeka, Kansas, and Solomon Devore Butcher and Lynn Jefferson Butcher, who operated as S.D. Butcher & Son, Kearney, Nebraska. There are also many postcards published by M.L. Zercher Book and Stationery Company in Topeka, Kansas.