Literature / Press & broadcasting
Robert Reitzel
1849–1898 · writer, editor, speaker
German-American freethinker who published the radical literary weekly Der arme Teufel in Detroit from 1884 until his death in 1898.
- Born
Weitenau (Steinen), Baden, Germany- Died
Detroit, Michigan
aged 49- Detroit years
- 1880s–1898
01 / The Detroit story
The Detroit story
Reitzel came to New York in 1870 and drifted through years as a tramp, laborer and preacher before settling in Detroit, then a city with a large and politically lively German population. He became a popular speaker for workers' clubs, freethinker societies and Turner gymnastic associations across North America. In 1884 he launched Der arme Teufel (The Poor Devil) in Detroit, a weekly of essays, poems and polemics that became the most widely read German-language literary journal ever published in America. Its tone was witty and irreverent: Reitzel attacked church, state and respectable opinion in the name of individual freedom, with a humane, undogmatic anarchism that kept friendly distance from party lines. He edited the paper until his death in Detroit in 1898 at the age of 49; it continued for a few years after him, in all 822 issues.
Highlights
- Arrived in America in 1870 and settled in Detroit
- Founded the weekly Der arme Teufel in Detroit in 1884
- The most widely read German-language literary journal in America
- Edited it until his death in Detroit in 1898