Anton Fendrich

Born in Offenburg on April 8, 1868, Anton Fendrich was the son of a railway official. After studying economics in Zurich without completing a degree, he worked as an editor for Social Democratic newspapers and became, in 1898, the youngest member of the second chamber of the Baden parliament.

He later stepped away from active politics and turned more strongly toward literature, philosophy, art, and the natural world. He wrote hiking and nature guides as well as feuilleton pieces, building a career that mixed journalism with books meant for general readers.

During the First World War he returned to political writing, and in later years he lived in Freiburg im Breisgau as a private teacher while continuing to publish nature writing, regional literature, and memoir-based work. He received the Johann-Peter-Hebel-Preis in 1946 and died in Freiburg on January 6, 1949.