Tour Scotland 4K Winter travel video of a road trip drive, with Scottish music, on the A914 road on ancestry, genealogy, family history visit to Balmullo in North East Fife. This Scottish village is seven miles from the town of St Andrews and near to the villages of Lucklawhill, Guardbridge, Dairsie and Leuchars. Now largely a dormitory settlement, it was once a weaving village. Balmullo was the home of the picture postcard cartoonist Martin Anderson known as Cynicus, whose red sandstone Cynicus Castle was demolished in 1939, seven years after his death. Martin Anderson was born in Leuchars, Fife, in 1854. After his mother, Margaret Martin, separated from his father, she moved with her children to Cambuslang, Glasgow. Anderson studied at Glasgow School of Art under Robert Greenlees, in Ingram Street Glasgow. On leaving he worked as a designer at a calico printer. When Martin was 19, he founded The St. Mungo Art Club in Glasgow, intended to be an alternative to the grander Glasgow Art Club. In 1880 Martin was invited to join John Leng and Company, the publisher of titles such as the Dundee Advertiser, the Evening Telegraph, Peoples Journal, and Peoples Friend) as its staff artist. Accepting the position, Andersen became the first such artist to be employed by any daily newspaper in Britain, until then daily newspapers were not illustrated. He moved to Broughty Ferry near Dundee. In 1891 he moved back to London, England, in an attempt to get his work noticed, taking a shop in Drury Lane, with the sign Cynicus Publishing Company over its door and with prints of his cartoons displayed in its windows. The Satires of Cynicus began to attract public attention and increasing sales. The edition was limited to 1,000 copies, and by the end of 1891 it was almost out of print. In the late 1890s a new market for his products was quickly emerging, that of picture postcards. In 1898 Anderson began working for Blum and Degan where he designed court sized postcards. In 1902, after the Post Office allowed divided back postcards, picture postcards became very popular and also began to be widely collected. The outbreak of the First World War put an end to the seaside postcard market in Britain, and Cynicus Art Publishing Company was forced to close. In 1915 Anderson moved to Edinburgh, leasing a basement shop in York Place. The printing plates for his postcards were sent from Leeds, but for uncertain reasons, and without the knowledge of Andersen, they were sold for scrap. In 1924 his Edinburgh shop was destroyed by fire, everything inside it was lost, and he did not have the funds to repair and restock it. He retired to his castle like mansion in Balmullo to live in increasing poverty. Martin Anderson died suddenly on 14 April 1932 and was buried in the Martin family grave in Tayport Old Churchyard. The funeral was never paid for and his grave is unmarked, without a tombstone, His mansion in Balmullo was extensively vandalised after his death. When driving in Scotland slow down and enjoy the trip. Officially, the Scottish winter runs from the 21st of December through to the 20th March.
All photographs are copyright of Sandy Stevenson, Tour Scotland, and may not be used without permission.
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