Otto Funk

Who was Otto Funk?

Otto Funk was a German-American fiddler who gained fame as "the Walking Fiddler" in the Guinness Book of World Records for playing his Hopf violin every step of the way as he walked from New York to San Francisco in 1929, a trip of 4,165 miles. See, e.g., Guinness Book of World Records, McWhirter, N. and McWhirter, R., Revised and enlarged new Bantam edition, Stirling Publishing Company. He was 60 years old at the time of his marathon walk. He stood five feet two inches tall, and weighed approximately 100 pounds.

In the era of roller derbies, 30-day dance contests and walkathons, Otto Funk’s whimsical journey was an attempt to draw attention to his abilities as an old-time fiddler and durable walker. On April 29, 1928, he had been featured in a cover story in the St. Louis Globe-Democrat’s rotogravure Magazine section, and this publicity sparked his interest in making a national name for himself. His hope was that his fame might exceed that of his musical rival, the Austrian-American violinist Fritz Kreisler.

Funk’s parents had migrated to America from West Prussia in the mid-19th century, and were married in Pilot Knob, Missouri in 1859. Following the ravishing of their 80-acre family farm by Confederate soldiers, they moved to St. Louis, Missouri, where Otto was born in 1868. In 1881, the family bought a 360-acre farm in Montgomery County, Illinois, and relocated there.