hike - Germany / Federal Republic of Germany 1974 - 30 Pfennig

In 1974, for the 100th time, the birthday of the two founders of the German youth hostels Richard Schirrmann and Wilhelm Münker is celebrated. Richard Schirrmann was born on May 15, 1874 in Grunenfeld Kreis Heiligenbeil (East Prussia). As a teacher in Gelsenkirchen and Altena, he became aware of how necessary for the health and mental development of the industrial youth was the turn to the manifold sources of nature. In 1909, the crucial idea came to him on a school hike: If one would use the vacant school houses as lodging places during the holidays, there would immediately be a widespread hostel network in the whole country. In his own elementary school, he turned a classroom into such a first holiday hostel, which he called the "Volksschule hostel." When he demanded in convincing words at the general meeting of the Sauerland Mountain Association in 1910 the creation of hostels for the students, he won his best comrade in Hilchenbach manufacturer Wilhelm Münker. Wilhelm Münker, born November 29, 1874 in Hilchenbach / Kreis Siegen, had become an enthusiastic hiking, hiking and nature lover at a young age through hikes in Siegerland and Sauerland. In the Sauerland Mountain Association, he became a member of the executive committee and recognized the tremendous importance of the work in the making. The two men complemented each other excellently. "If Schirrmann was the creator and herald of this work, Münker was the unsurpassed organizer who gave Schirrmann's ideas a primordial foundation and a universally valid form" (Karl Hartung, 1953). By the outbreak of the First World War, 372 youth hostels had already been built, in 1920 there were more than 1000, the peak was reached in 1927 with 2,195 youth hostels. There are now more than 600 youth hostels in the Federal Republic of Germany where the Youth Hostel Association expects about 10 million overnight stays this year. In addition, there are youth hostels in all continents, as more and more people recognize: Hiking is not only the healthiest form of transportation, but hiking gives by getting to know nature and homeland, from other people and foreign countries, by expanding their own skills and shaping the Character's diverse joie de vivre.