Baedeker Friedrich's widow Eva Baedeker, née Konitz (1913−1984), piloted the firm until she died in 1984. She was the last Baedeker to play an active role in running the Baedeker publishing house founded in 1827, and negotiated the sale of the Freiburg branch to Langenscheidt before she died. However, the "Karl Baedeker" brand name has been retained by all subsequent owners of the company, in one form or another. Since 1979 Baedeker travel guides have appeared as "Baedeker Allianz Reiseführer" (travel guides), published in collaboration with the German insurance group Allianz. Multi-coloured with copious illustrations and in many languages, they now
Karl Baedeker Karl Baedeker Karl Ludwig Johannes Baedeker (; ; 3 November 1801 – 4 October 1859) was a German publisher whose company, Baedeker, set the standard for authoritative guidebooks for tourists. Karl Baedeker was descended from a long line of printers, booksellers and publishers. 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 "Essendische Zeitung", and the family expected that Karl, too, would eventually join the firm. Karl changed the spelling of the family name