William Frederic Badè (January 22, 1871 – March 4, 1936), perhaps best known as the literary executor and biographer of John Muir, was a versatile scholar of wide interests.

He attended Moravian College and the associated seminary, earning his way by playing organ and giving music lessons, attaining AB and BD degrees.

After short pastoral appointments at Unionville, Michigan, and Chaska, Minnesota, he returned to Moravian College as instructor of Greek and German, earning his PhD from that institution in 1898 with a thesis on the Assyrian flood legends.

[4] As a professor, Badè was among the first in the United States to teach the then-new and controversial Documentary Hypothesis concerning the origins and authorship of the Pentateuch.

[5] An avid outdoorsman with strong interests in ornithology and botany, Badè first met John Muir through the Sierra Club, which he joined in 1903.

Badè compiled and edited materials from Muir's journals and other unpublished writings as well as short published pieces, resulting in publication of A Thousand-Mile Walk to the Gulf, The Cruise of the Corwin, and Steep Trails.

He traveled in the Middle East in 1909 and had planned to start fieldwork in Syria in 1914, but World War I and his appointment as Muir's executor intervened.

Albright considered Tell en-Nasbeh, (about 7 miles north of Jerusalem) a possible location of the biblical city of Mizpah in Benjamin but favored Nabi Samwil as the most likely.

The site was initially identified in part based on a German World War I aerial photograph showing evidence of walls and alteration of vegetation over buildings.

Badè brought his characteristic thoroughness and organizational talent to bear, seeking advice from prominent archaeologists including Albright and Clarence S. Fisher.

He worked prominently with Muir and other members on the Hetch Hetchy Valley campaign, including serving as vice president of the Society for Preservation of National Parks.

He was California state chairman of the Commission for Relief in Belgium and Northern France 1915–1917, vice president of the American Alpine Club 1920–1922, and a trustee of Mills College 1918–1931.

[13] He served on the board of the School of American Research of the Archaeological Institute of America at Santa Fe 1929–1936, and was president of the Society for Biblical Literature and Exegesis in 1930.

He was a son of Japan scholar and peace activist Sidney Gulick and later served as professor of English and Dean of Arts and Sciences at San Diego State University.