Travel For The Masses – Arthur Frommer Dies At 95

Travelers of every stripe, take note: one of your greatest advocates has set off on his latest – and last – journey. Arthur Frommer, pioneering guidebook guru, has died at the age of 95.

Frommer was born in Lynchburg, VA, in 1929. A stint in the Army during the Korean War found him serving in Germany and provided him with his first opportunity to travel. To satisfy the curiosity of his fellow GIs, he “self-published The G.I.’s Guide to Europe in 1955,” according to Travel Weekly. “It quickly sold out in PXs across the continent.”

Beginning in 1957 with the publication of Europe on 5 Dollars a Day, Frommer, in the words of his daughter Pauline, “democratized travel, showing average Americans how anyone can afford to travel widely and better understand the world.”

Frommer’s philosophy, as described by the Associated Press, was prescient:  Avoid the expensive, ritzy places in favor of smaller, authentic hotels, inns, and restaurants preferred by locals. The AP notes that Frommer’s timing couldn’t have been better: 

“It didn’t hurt that his books hit the market as the rise of jet travel made getting to Europe easier than crossing the Atlantic by ship. The books became so popular that there was a time when you couldn’t visit a place like the Eiffel Tower without spotting Frommer’s guidebooks in the hands of every other American tourist.”

Practically every tourist has used – at one time or another – Frommer’s guides. Older travelers will remember the pre-internet world when London, Paris, Budapest and other locales seemed much farther away and – before global culture turned so many places into miniature Americas – much more foreign. Frommer gave them the info they needed to boldly venture where few tourists had gone before.

Frommer was adamant about the benefits of seeing the world. The BBC quoted him:

“Travel has taught me that despite all the exotic differences in dress and language, of political and religious beliefs, that all the world’s people are essentially alike…We all have the same urges and concerns, we all yearn for the same goals.”

Arthur Frommer has now, as Hamlet once phrased it, embarked for “The undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveler returns.” Still, one tends to think that if a sensible, budget-conscious guide to the afterlife is ever written, Arthur Frommer’s name will be on the cover.