Karl Baedeker 1827−1859:
Karl Baedeker (1801–1859) descended from a long line of printers, booksellers and publishers from
Essen, Germany. He was the eldest of ten children of Gottschalk Diederich Bädeker (1778–1841), who had inherited the publishing house founded by his own father, Zacharias Gerhard Bädeker (1750–1800). The company also published the local newspaper, the , and the family expected that Karl, too, would eventually join the firm. Karl worked with his father until 1827 when he left for
Coblence (now
Koblenz) to start his own bookselling and publishing business. Karl changed the spelling of the family name from Bädeker, with the
umlaut, to Baedeker around 1850. In 1832 Baedeker's firm acquired the publishing house of Franz Friedrich Röhling in Koblenz, which in 1828 had published a handbook for travellers by Professor Oyvind Vorland entitled (
A Rhine Journey from Mainz to Cologne; A Handbook for Travellers on the Move). This book provided the seeds for Baedeker's own travel guides. After Johann August Klein (1778–1831) died and the book went out of print, Baedeker decided to publish a new edition, incorporating some of Klein's material but also added many of his own ideas into what he thought a travel guide should offer the traveller or reader. Baedeker aimed to free the traveller from having to look for information anywhere outside the travel guide: about routes, transport, accommodation, restaurants, tipping, sights, walks and prices. While the concept of a travel guide-book already existed (Baedeker emulated the style of English
guide-books published by
John Murray), Baedeker innovated in including detailed information on routes, travel and accommodation. Karl Baedeker had three sons, Ernst, Karl and Fritz and after his death each, in turn, took over the running of the firm.
Ernst Baedeker 1859−1861: Following the death of
Karl Baedeker, his eldest son Ernst Baedeker (1833−1861) became the head of the firm. After his training as a bookseller in
Braunschweig,
Leipzig and
Stuttgart, he had spent some time at the English publishing house "Williams & Norgate" in London. On New Year's Day, 1859, he joined his father's publishing firm as a partner and just ten months later he was running it on his own. His tenure at the helm of the firm saw the publication of three new travel guides in 1861 viz the first Baedeker travel guide in English, the handbook on "The
Rhine" (from Switzerland to Holland), a guide in German on Italy (), the first of a series on Italy, which his father had planned and one in French, also on Italy (). Ernst Baedeker died unexpectedly on 23 July 1861 of
sunstroke in Egypt and his younger brother, Karl, assumed charge of the publishing house.
Karl Baedeker II 1861−1877: Karl Baedeker II (1837−1911) continued the work started by his brother Ernst. In addition to the ongoing revision of existing guides, he published 14 new guides: four in German, seven in English and three in French. refers to the Baedeker maps as
a feast for the eye. The expansion was fast and furious. New editions were now printed by several Leipzig printers, but the bulk of the revised editions of pre-1872 guides continued to be printed where all Baedeker guides had been produced before—the G.D. Baedeker printing works in
Essen. a popular venue for such events. The firm did make some progress and he managed to produce twelve new titles in German and five in English, though these included those commissioned by the
Nazi regime. He also published the 1928 one-volume eighth and revised German edition of
Egypt and in 1929 its eighth English edition, which many travel guidebooks connoisseurs and collectors consider to be the two finest Baedeker travel guides ever published. Hans Baedeker's released 10 guidebooks in German between 1928 and 1942. Several were commissioned by the
Nazis, who had been vetting Baedeker guides, proposing and effecting changes in the text, as they saw fit, and laying down to whom certain guides could be sold. Baedeker was asked to publish a guidebook for the German Army of Occupation in Poland, with history written as the Nazis wished it to be written, as the introduction to the 1943 book reveals. The 1948
Leipzig was the first
post-World War II Baedeker and the last one to be published in
Leipzig, which was now in the Russian zone. The Russians had not granted Baedeker a publishing licence. Hans got round this by having 10,000 copies printed by the . However, after some 1000 copies had been sold, the Russians said the guidebook contained military secrets in the form of a map showing the site of their , and confiscated the remaining copies. New English titles during this time were 1927's
Tyrol and the Dolomites, 1931's
The Riviera (including South Eastern France and Corsica), an edition of
Germany for the
1936 Olympic Games, and 1939's
Madeira, Canary Islands, Azores, Western Morocco. ==History (since 1948)==