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Hiram Bingham III (November 19,1875 –June 6,1956) was an American academic,explorer and politician. In 1911,he publicized the existence of the Inca citadel of Machu Picchu which he rediscovered with the guidance of local indigenous farmers. Later,Bingham served as the 69th Governor of Connecticut for a single day in 1925—the shortest term in history. He had been elected in 1924 as governor,but was also elected to the Senate and chose that position. He served as a member of the United States Senate until 1933.
In his first academic position,he taught history and politics at Harvard. He next served as preceptor (teacher) under Woodrow Wilson at Princeton University. Princeton "did not much favor Latin American history." But in 1907,when Yale sought a replacement for Bourne,who had died an early death,it appointed Bingham as a lecturer in South American history.[3] He became one of the pioneers in the U.S. of teaching and research on Latin American history. In 1908,he published an assessment of the field's prospects,"The Possibilities of South American History and Politics as a Field for Research," in which he surveyed library and archival resources in the U.S. as well as in South America.[4] From 1924,he was a member of the Acorn Club.
Explorer
Bingham (upper right) with a local guide on a jungle bridge at Espiritu Pampa in Peru,hand-colored glass slide,1911
Bingham was not a trained archaeologist. But while he served at Yale as a lecturer and professor in South American history at Yale,he journeyed to South America and rediscovered the largely forgotten Inca city of Machu Picchu. In 1908 he had served as a delegate to the First Pan American Scientific Congress at Santiago,Chile. On his way home via Peru,a local prefect convinced him to visit the pre-Columbian city of Choquequirao. Bingham published an account of this trip in Across South America;an account of a journey from Buenos Aires to Lima by way of Potosí,with notes on Brazil,Argentina,Bolivia,Chile,and Peru (1911).[5]
Bingham was thrilled by the prospect of unexplored Inca cities,and organized the 1911 Yale Peruvian Expedition,[6] one of the objectives of which was to search for the last capital of the Incas. Guided by locals,he rediscovered and correctly identified both Vitcos (then called Rosaspata) and Vilcabamba (then called Espíritu Pampa),which he named "Eromboni Pampa".[6] He did not correctly recognize Vilcabamba as the last capital,instead continuing onward and misidentifying Machu Picchu as the "Lost City of the Incas". Decades later,Bingham's oversight was rectified by the Andean explorer Vince Lee,whose detailed researches proved that Vilcabamba was indeed the Incas' last capital.
On July 24,1911,Melchor Arteaga led Bingham to Machu Picchu,which had been largely forgotten by everybody except the small number of people living in the immediately neighboring valley. In addition,Cusco explorers Enrique Palma,Gabino Sanchez,and Agustín Lizárraga are said to have reached the site in 1901. Two local missionaries,Thomas Payne and Stuart McNairn,are credited by descendants with having climbed to the ruins in 1906.[citation needed]
Bingham returned to Peru in 1912,1914,and 1915 with the support of Yale and the National Geographic Society. In Lost City of the Incas (1948),Bingham related how he came to believe that Machu Picchu housed a major religious shrine and served as a training center for religious leaders. Modern archaeological research has since determined that the site was not a religious center but a royal estate to which Inca leaders and their entourage repaired during the Andean summer.[7]
A key element of the expeditions' legacy are the collections of exotic animals,antiquities,and human skeletal remains. These objects introduced the modern world to a new view of ancient Peru and allowed 20th-century interpreters to interpret Machu Picchu as a "lost city" that Bingham "scientifically discovered". Bingham merged his reliance on prospecting by local huaqueros with the notion that science had a sovereign claim on all artifacts that might contribute to the accumulation of knowledge.[8]
Machu Picchu has become one of the major tourist attractions in South America. Bingham is recognized as the man who brought the site to world attention,although many others helped. The switchback-filled road that carries tourist buses to the site from the Urubamba River is called Carretera Hiram Bingham (the Hiram Bingham Highway).[9]
Bingham's book Lost City of the Incas became a bestseller upon its publication in 1948.[10]
Bingham has been cited as a possible inspiration for the film character Harry Steele,played by Charlton Heston in the 1954 film Secret of the Incas,which is about a fictional archaeological dig at Machu Picchu,and shot on location. The Steele character,and some scenarios in that film,subsequently inspired the film character Indiana Jones,and the 'Map room' scenario in Raiders of the Lost Ark.
Peru has long sought the return of the estimated 40,000 artifacts,including mummies,ceramics,and bones,that Bingham excavated and exported from Machu Picchu. He had been given permission through a decree by the Peruvian government. Peru had since argued that the objects were only loaned to Yale,not given.[11] On September 14,2007,an agreement was made between Yale University and the Peruvian government for the objects' return. On April 12,2008,the Peruvian government said it had revised previous estimates of 4,000 pieces up to 40,000.[12] In 2012 Yale University began returning thousands of these objects to Peru.[11]
An 1874 map shows the site of Machu Picchu.[14] Soon after Bingham announced the existence of Machu Picchu,others came forward claiming to have seen the city first,such as British missionary Thomas Payne and German engineer named J. M. von Hassel.[15] Recent discoveries have put forth a new claimant,a German named Augusto Berns[de] who bought land opposite the Machu Picchu mountain in the 1860s and tried to raise money from investors to plunder nearby Incan ruins.[citation needed]
Temple of the Three Windows,once featuring the inscription "A. Lizárraga 1902" left by Lizárraga,later erased by Bingham
In 1911,Bingham found the name Agustín Lizárraga and the date 1902 written in charcoal on one of the walls of the Temple of the Three Windows. Initially disappointed,he documented in his journal:"Agustín Lizárraga is discoverer of Machu Picchu and lives at San Miguel Bridge just before passing".[16]
Prior to the 19th and 20th centuries at least one conquistador,Baltasar de Ocampo,was known to have visited the site in the late 16th century. Ocampo left detailed notes on the richly carved and finely dressed stone lintels,among other notable features of the mountaintop palace.[17]
Marriage and family
Hiram Bingham painted by Mary Foote,sister of Harry Ward Foote,the Yale chemistry professor who was Bingham's companion on his trips to Peru
Bingham married Alfreda Mitchell,granddaughter of Charles L. Tiffany and his wife,on November 20,1900. They had seven sons together:Woodbridge (1901–1986) (professor),Hiram Bingham IV (1903–1988) (diplomat and World War II hero),Alfred Mitchell Bingham (1905–1998) (lawyer and author),Charles Tiffany (1906–1993) (physician),Brewster (1908–1995) (minister),Mitchell (1910–1994) (artist),and Jonathan Brewster Bingham (1914–1986) (Democratic Congressman).[18]
After a divorce he married Suzanne Carroll Hill in June 1937. His former wife,Alfreda Mitchell,married pianist Henry Gregor in August 1937.[19]
In 1982 Temple University Press published Char Miller's doctoral dissertation on the Bingham family titled Fathers and sons:The Bingham family and the American mission.
Military
Bingham achieved the rank of captain of the Connecticut National Guard in 1916. In 1917,he became an aviator and organized the United States Schools of Military Aeronautics at eight universities to provide ground school training for aviation cadets. He served the Aviation Section,U.S. Signal Corps and the Air Service,attaining the rank of lieutenant colonel. In Issoudun,France,Bingham commanded the Third Aviation Instruction Center,the Air Service's largest primary instruction and pursuit training school.[20] He became a supporter of the Air Service in their post-war quest for independence from the Army and supported that effort,in part,with the publication of his wartime experiences titled,An Explorer in the Air Service published in 1920 by Yale University Press.[21]
Politics
Hiram Bingham III at his desk in 1917
In 1922,Bingham was elected lieutenant governor of Connecticut,an office he held until 1924. In November 1924,he was elected governor.
On December 16,1924,Bingham was also elected as a Republican to serve in the United States Senate to fill a vacancy created by the suicide of Frank Bosworth Brandegee. Bingham defeated noted educator Hamilton Holt by a handy margin. Now both governor-elect and senator-elect,Bingham served as governor for one day (January 7–8,1925),the shortest term of any Connecticut governor,before resigning to take his Senate seat.[22]
Bingham was reelected to a full six-year Senate term in 1926.
He was Chairman of the Committee on Printing and then Chairman of the Committee on Territories and Insular Possessions. President Calvin Coolidge appointed Bingham to the President's Aircraft Board during his first term in the Senate;the press quickly dubbed the ex-explorer "The Flying Senator".
Bingham failed in his second reelection effort in the wake of the 1932 Democratic landslide following the start of the Great Depression. He left the Senate at the end of his second term in 1933.[23]
During World War II,Bingham lectured at several United States Navy training schools. In 1951 he was appointed Chairman of the Civil Service Commission Loyalty Review Board,an assignment he kept through 1953.
Censure in the Senate
The Senate Judiciary Subcommittee investigated an arrangement between Bingham,his clerk,and a lobbyist who agreed to pass information on to Bingham's office after executing a plan that was irregular "even by the standards of his day." Bingham took his clerk off duty,and paid his salary to the lobbyist,thus allowing him to attend as a Senate staffer to closed meetings of the Finance Committee's deliberations on tariff legislation.
The Judiciary Subcommittee initially condemned Bingham's scheme but recommended no formal Senate action. Subsequently,Bingham decided to label the subcommittee's inquiry a partisan witch hunt,provoking further Senate interest. Eventually the Senate passed a resolution of censure on November 4,1929,by a vote of 54 to 22.[24]
A lost city is an urban settlement that fell into terminal decline and became extensively or completely uninhabited, with the consequence that the site's former significance was no longer known to the wider world. The locations of many lost cities have been forgotten, but some have been rediscovered and studied extensively by scientists. Recently abandoned cities or cities whose location was never in question might be referred to as ruins or ghost towns. Smaller settlements may be referred to as abandoned villages. The search for such lost cities by European explorers and adventurers in Africa, the Americas, and Southeast Asia from the 15th century onward eventually led to the development of archaeology.
Machu Picchu is a 15th-century Inca citadel located in the Eastern Cordillera of southern Peru on a mountain ridge at 2,430 meters (7,970 ft). Often referred to as the "Lost City of the Incas", it is the most familiar icon of the Inca Empire. It is located in the Machupicchu District within the Urubamba Province above the Sacred Valley, which is 80 kilometers (50 mi) northwest of the city of Cusco. The Urubamba River flows past it, cutting through the Cordillera and creating a canyon with a subtropical mountain climate.
Hiram Bingham II was a Protestant Christian missionary to Hawaii and the Gilbert Islands.
Vilcabamba or Willkapampa, often called the Lost City of the Incas, is a lost city in the Echarate District of La Convención Province in the Cuzco Region of Peru. Vilcabamba, in Quechua, means "sacred plain". The modern name for the Inca ruins of Vilcabamba is Espíritu Pampa.
Ollantaytambo is a town and an Inca archaeological site in southern Peru some 72 km (45 mi) by road northwest of the city of Cusco. It is located at an altitude of 2,792 m (9,160 ft) above sea level in the district of Ollantaytambo, province of Urubamba, Cusco region. During the Inca Empire, Ollantaytambo was the royal estate of Emperor Pachacuti, who conquered the region, and built the town and a ceremonial center. At the time of the Spanish conquest of Peru, it served as a stronghold for Manco Inca Yupanqui, leader of the Inca resistance. Located in the Sacred Valley of the Incas, it is now an important tourist attraction on account of its Inca ruins and its location en route to one of the most common starting points for the four-day, three-night hike known as the Inca Trail.
Vitcos was a residence of Inca nobles and a ceremonial center of the Neo-Inca State (1537–1572). The archaeological site of ancient Vitcos, called Rosaspata, is in the Vilcabamba District of La Convención Province, Cusco Region in Peru. The ruins are on a ridge overlooking the junction of two small rivers and the village of Pucyura. The Incas had occupied Vilcabamba, the region in which Vitcos is located, about 1450 CE, establishing major centers at Machu Picchu, Choquequirao, Vitcos, and Vilcabamba. Vitcos was often the residence of the rulers of the Neo-Inca state until the Spanish conquest of this last stronghold of the Incas in 1572.
Llaqtapata (Quechua) llaqta place, pata elevated place / above, at the top / edge, bank, shore, pronounced 'yakta-pahta', Hispanicized Llactapata) is an archaeological site about 5 km (3.1 mi) east of Machu Picchu. The complex is located in the Cusco Region, La Convención Province, Santa Teresa District, high on a ridge between the Ahobamba and Santa Teresa drainages.
PeruRail is a railway operator providing tourist, freight, and charter services in southern Peru. It was founded in 1999 by two Peruvian entrepreneurs and the British company Sea Containers.
Choquequirao is an Incan site in southern Peru, similar in structure and architecture to Machu Picchu. The ruins are buildings and terraces at levels above and below Sunch'u Pata, the truncated hill top. The hilltop was anciently leveled and ringed with stones to create a 30 by 50 m platform.
Charles Wiener (1851–1913) was an Austrian-French scientist-explorer. Born in Vienna, he is perhaps best known as the explorer who traveled extensively in Peru, climbed the Illimani and came close to re-discovering Machu Picchu.
Echarate District is one of fourteen districts of the province La Convención in Peru. The town of Echarte, near the Urubamba River, is the capital of the district. In 2016, part of Echarte district was incorporated into the newly created Megantoni District.
The Inca Trail to Machu Picchu is a hiking trail in Peru that terminates at Machu Picchu. It consists of three overlapping trails: Mollepata, Classic, and One Day. Mollepata is the longest of the three routes with the highest mountain pass and intersects with the Classic route before crossing Warmiwañusqa. Located in the Andes mountain range, the trail passes through several types of Andean environments including cloud forest and alpine tundra. Settlements, tunnels, and many Incan ruins are located along the trail before ending the terminus at the Sun Gate on Machu Picchu mountain. The two longer routes require an ascent to beyond 4,200 metres (13,800 ft) above sea level, which can result in altitude sickness.
Patallacta, Llactapata or Q'ente Marka is an archaeological site in Peru located in the Cusco Region, Urubamba Province, Machupicchu District. It is situated southeast of the site Machu Picchu, at the confluence of the rivers Cusichaca and Vilcanota on a mountain named Patallacta.
Intihuatana is a ritual stone in South America associated with the astronomic clock or calendar of the Inca. Its name is derived from the local Quechua language. The most notable Intihuantana is an archaeological site located at Machu Picchu in the Sacred Valley near Machu Picchu, Peru. The name of the stone is derived from Quechua: inti means "sun", and wata- is the verb root "to tie, hitch (up)". The Quechua -na suffix derives nouns for tools or places. Hence inti watana is literally an instrument or place to "tie up the sun", often expressed in English as "The Hitching Post of the Sun".
Runkuraqay or Runku Raqay is an archaeological site on a mountain of the same name in Peru located in the Cusco Region, Urubamba Province, Machupicchu District. It is situated southeast of the archaeological site Machu Picchu and south of the Vilcanota river. The ruins lie on the southern slope of the mountain Runkuraqay near the Runkuraqay pass, northeast of the archaeological site Sayacmarca and southeast of the site Qunchamarka.
The Peru–Yale University dispute was a century-long conflict between the government of Peru and Yale University about the rightful ownership of Inca human remains and artifacts from Machu Picchu, an ancient Inca site high in the Peruvian Andes active c. 1420–1532. In the several years following his re-discovery of Machu Picchu in 1911, Yale explorer Hiram Bingham III removed thousands of objects – including pottery, stone tools, and human bones – from the archaeological site and brought them to New Haven, Connecticut. The circumstances of these transfers were disputed, with some, including Bingham, claiming that Yale agreed to borrow the artifacts for a period of 18 months to conduct studies. Peru attempted to regain the collection in the 1920s, but Yale resisted. Tensions rose between 2006 and 2010 with a lawsuit, activism by Peruvians and Yale alumni, and a plea to then–U.S. President Barack Obama by then–Peruvian President Alan Garcia. On November 19, 2010, Peru and Yale reached an agreement that the remains and artifacts would be returned. In early 2011, Yale and University of Cusco (UNSAAC) signed a further agreement that the two institutions would partner to create a museum and research center in Cusco. The museum, the Museo Machu Picchu, was opened to the public in November 2011. The collection is regarded by experts to be among the most valuable collections of Inca artifacts.
Belmond Sanctuary Lodge is a small hotel situated at the entrance to the Machu Picchu Inca citadel. It is the only hotel at this World Heritage Site, and can be accessed by foot or by rail.
The Belmond Hiram Bingham is a luxury train operating day return trips from Poroy station outside Cusco to Aguas Calientes, the station for Machu Picchu in Peru.
Richard Lewis Burger, Ph.D., is an archaeologist and anthropologist from the United States. He is currently a professor at Yale University and holds the positions of Charles J. MacCurdy Professor in the Anthropology Department, Chair of the Council on Archaeological Studies, and Curator in the Division of Anthropology at the Peabody Museum of Natural History. He has carried out archaeological excavations in the Peruvian Andes since 1975, publishing several books and many articles on Chavin culture, a pre-Hispanic civilization that developed in the northern Andean highlands of Peru from 1000 BC to 400 BC. Burger is married to Lucy Salazar, a Peruvian archaeologist and long time collaborator on many research projects. His former doctoral student Sabine Hyland has become well-known as an Andean anthropologist.
Agustín Lizárraga Ruiz was a Peruvian explorer and farmer who discovered Machu Picchu on 14 July 1902, nine years prior to American explorer Hiram Bingham.
↑ Howard F. Cline, "Latin American History: Development of Its Study and Teaching in the United States Since 1898," in Latin American History: Essays on Its Study and Teaching, 1898–1965. Austin: University of Texas Press 1967, vol. 1, pp. 7–8.
↑ Hiram Bingham, "The Possibilities of South American History and Politics as a Field for Research", reprinted in Latin American History: Essays in Its Study and Teaching, section III "Pioneers, 1900–1918." Austin: University of Texas Press 1967, vol. 1, pp. 58–65.
Balm, Roger. "Discovery as autobiography: the Machu Picchu case." Terrae Incognitae 40.1 (2008): 102–113.
Bingham, Alfred M. "Raiders of the Lost City" American Heritage (1987) 38#5 pp 54–63.
Bingham, Alfred Mitchell. Explorer of Machu Picchu: Portrait of Hiram Bingham (Triune Books, 1989).
Gade, Daniel W. "Urubamba Ramble: Hiram Bingham (1875–1956) and His Artful Encounter with Machu Picchu." in Gade, "Spell of the Urubamba: Anthropogeographical Essays on an Andean Valley in Space and Time" (Springer, 2016) pp.239–272.
Hall, Amy Cox. "Collecting a “Lost City” for Science: Huaquero Vision and the Yale Peruvian Expeditions to Machu Picchu, 1911, 1912, and 1914–15." Ethnohistory 59.2 (2012): 293–321. online[dead link]
Rice, Mark. Making Machu Picchu: The Politics of Tourism in Twentieth-Century Peru (U of North Carolina Press, 2018). Online review.
Salvatore, Ricardo D. Disciplinary Conquest: US Scholars in South America, 1900–1945 (Duke University Press, 2016).
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