The fantastic story of the 'utopia' that Europeans tried to found in the Galapagos Islands

The Galapagos Islands, off the coast of Ecuador in the Pacific Ocean, were the setting for stories that changed the world.

The most remembered is that led by Charles Darwin (1809-1882). It was from his fieldwork in the archipelago that the British naturalist formulated his famous theory of evolution by natural selection.

Other lesser-known accounts involve pirates who used the islands as a refuge during colonial times, or sailors who docked on their coasts to seize the famous turtles that would serve as food for the rest of their voyage.

But one of the archipelago's darkest stories served as inspiration for award-winning American director Ron Howard (the same director of A Beautiful Mind , 2001), when creating his new film, Eden .

The case occurred in the 1930s and involved a group of European couples and families who arrived on one of the islands in the archipelago — Floreana — with the intention of building a "tropical utopia" there.

It's a story of dedication, betrayal, drama and even humor.

The film portrays the lives of a group of Germans: Baroness Eloise Bosquet de Wagner Wehrhorn, the doctor Friedrich Ritter, his wife Dore Strauch Ritter and the couple Heinz and Margret Wittmer.

They all arrived on that uninhabited island between 1929 and 1932. Some came with the idea of ​​establishing a colony of sorts. Others were looking for an idyllic vacation spot.

But the disputes between them turned that paradise into a nightmare.

"These people have given us a fascinating insight," Howard told the BBC.

"There's suspense, betrayal, and violence," Howard describes. "There's tragedy, but also humor and nobility. And it all happened in Darwin's Galapagos."

And all in a philosophical context.

Lovers on the run

The publication of Darwin's book, with its revolutionary theory of evolution ( On the Origin of Species , 1859), made the Galapagos Islands become a kind of legend, both for researchers and for curious European citizens, who began to analyze the story with great attention.

In 1929, Germany was experiencing a severe economic crisis. Many of its residents were looking for alternatives to survive or new horizons for the future.

One of them was Friedrich Ritter, a doctor with a passion for philosophy. He sought to apply many of the ideas of the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) to everyday life.

One day in 1929, Ritter met Dore Strauch, a sick woman who, thanks to his treatments, significantly improved her health.

During the process, Ritter tells her all his philosophical ideas, especially his project to put into practice an alternative way of life.

Strauch would later write a book about her experiences in the years that followed, titled Satan Visited Eden . She notes that Ritter's philosophical view of medicine powerfully captured her attention.

The doctor and the patient fell in love, but there was one problem: they were both married.

In the book, Strauch recounts that they made the decision together to flee Germany to a place where they could primarily apply Nietzsche's ideas about the Übermensch — the superman.

The idea that united them most was to prosper through discipline and determination, regardless of the challenges that appeared along the way.

And the place they chose to face this vision was the island of Floreana, in the Galapagos archipelago, the same place where Darwin formulated his laws of natural selection, where the strongest "prosper".

But they also began to engage in eccentric behavior. For example, before the trip, they had their teeth pulled to avoid dental problems in a remote paradise.

The couple arrived on the island in September 1929.

Little by little, they began to create, in the midst of that inhospitable landscape, a space to live and develop their philosophical ideas.

Shortly thereafter, intrigued by stories published in the German press, another couple arrived on the island to join them: Heinz and Margret Wittmer.

They had read about Ritter and Strauch's exploits and decided to accompany them. The main impetus for their decision was the health of Heinz's son, who suffered from asthma and could benefit from the island's climate.

Margret Wittmer would also write a book, titled Floreana's Post Office: An Extraordinary Life of a Woman at the End of the World .

Wittmer and Strauch's accounts tell that, although they did not consider themselves friends and there were certain tensions, the two families lived in Floreana without major problems, until the arrival of the self-styled baroness of Austrian origin Eloise Bosquet de Wagner Wehrhorn.

That's where the real conflicts began.

The disputes

According to Strauch and Wittmer, the baroness's idea was completely opposite to that of the two German couples who were the first to arrive on the island.

They emphasize that Eloise Bosquet intended to build a luxury hotel so that tourists could enjoy the island's pleasures and landscapes. Nothing could be further from the philosophical notion of discipline and determination.

The self-proclaimed baroness also arrived accompanied by two lovers. One of them began to display hostility toward the two German couples.

The conflict on the island was also aggravated by two details.

Bosquet began to use, disproportionately and without any care, the resources (such as water and food) that the two families had taken time to organize and manage.

The construction of the resort was also considered contrary to the lifestyle that the two families intended to lead on the island.

And, in addition, Bosquet reviewed the letters that the two families sent to the German press and rewrote them so that she would be at the center of the story.

The documentary The Galapagos Affair: When Satan Came to Paradise (2013), by filmmakers Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine, tells how tensions between the three groups began to rise.

The two couples began to complain about the alleged abuses committed by the baroness and her two lovers in their territories.

In her book, Dore Strauch herself reports that one of the baroness's lovers, Rudolph Lorenz, began to show his dislike for her and a certain discomfort at having to live in that place.

It is also noted that the hardships of life on the island strained the marriage between Friedrich Ritter and Dore Strauch.

Clearly, the island was far from paradise. But what no one expected was the next episode in the story.

On March 27, 1934, the baroness and one of her lovers, Robert Philipson, disappeared without a trace.

Dore Strauch and Margret Wittmer present different versions in their accounts.

According to Wittmer, the baroness boarded a ship bound for Tahiti. However, investigations have so far failed to uncover any trace of any ship that might have made this crossing from the island.

Strauch wrote that he heard a scream the night before the baroness disappeared and that he never saw a ship pass near the island.

The only objects found were her belongings, in the place on the island where she lived.

But the story didn't end there. The baroness's other lover left the island shortly thereafter, intending to visit the island of São Cristóvão.

Months passed until his mummified body was found on Marchena Island, which is part of the Galapagos archipelago but is in the complete opposite direction to where he was supposedly heading.

One final death in this story had less intriguing causes.

A few months after the baroness's disappearance, Friedrich Ritter ate spoiled chicken, which caused his death. Finding herself alone, his wife, Dore, decided to return to Europe.

The only people left from that adventure were Heinz and Margret Wittmer. They eventually opened a hotel on the island with their family.

The last survivor of all those involved in the story, Margret Wittmer died in the year 2000.

* With information from the BBC radio program Cautionary Tales.