Rower Siegfried Fricke was a native Canadian with German ancestors, and won the bronze medal with the West German coxed fours crew at the 1976 Montréal Olympics. He won a silver medal at the 1973 West German nationals, and two gold medals in 1975 and 1976, all with the coxed fours. In 1976, he added another silver with the coxed eights. He was awarded the Silver Bay Leaf, Germany’s highest sports award.
Fricke later studied public administration, and became a politician. First, he worked with the municipality of Frankfurt am Main, and then with the municipality of Raunheim. After a stint as mayor of Königstein (Taunus) from 2000-06, he became a full-time legislator of the Gießen district from 2006-11. He was a member of the right-winged party CDU.