Berg frei! Die Naturfreunde, or The Nature Friends, was founded in Vienna, Austria in 1895 by elementary schoolteacher Georg Schmiedl, blacksmith Alois Rohrauer, and law student and future president of Austria Karl Renner, at a time when the Hapsburg monarchy and other elites still controlled access to most of the Austrian mountains. Berg frei—free mountains—was their slogan.1
Die Naturfreunde founders Georg Schmiedl, Karl Renner, Alois Rohrauer  . 
Austrian stamp and 50 schilling coin with Karl Renner, President of Austria, 1945-1950 
Today, Naturefriends International (NFI) has 350,000 members in 43 member and/or partner organizations from 41 countries. NFI is a member of the Green 10, the platform of the ten largest European environmental organizations, and the European Environmental Bureau (EEB). The organization is also known internationally as Friends of Nature, Naturfreunde (German), Les Amis de la Nature (French), Amici della Natura (Italian), La Naturamikoj (Esperanto), and Natuurvrienden or NIVON (Dutch).  .  “Berg frei,” “Free mountains,” is the slogan of the Naturefriends The San Francisco BranchThe San Francisco branch started in 1912, and was known originally as Touristenverein die Naturfreunde, The Nature Friends Tourist Club. Learn more. 1Solnit, Rebecca. Wanderlust: A History of Walking. New York: Viking Penguin, 2000. Print. |
