Fritz Marti

Fritz Marti (1894–1991) came from Switzerland, where he had completed his doctorate in philosophy, to The University of Oregon, Eugene, in 1923. He was a serious, committed scholar in the tradition of German Idealism. The book is about his search for intellectual freedom in America.

He was part of the evolution of higher education in the United States in the 20th Century and taught at colleges and universities across the country such as Oregon, Goucher, Maryland, Chicago and Notre Dame. He became passionate about the role of a college education.

In 1947 he and his wife Gertrude Austin established a college preparatory school within a farm/home community in the hills of southern Ohio. It exists today as The Miami Valley School in Dayton, Ohio.

This is the story of his encounter with and adaptation to America and a look at American academic life during the early Twentieth Century.