Hiram Bingham III
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| Hiram Bingham | |
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| In office December 17, 1924 – March 3, 1933 |
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| Preceded by | Frank Bosworth Brandegee |
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| Succeeded by | Augustine Lonergan |
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| In office January 7 – January 8, 1925 |
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| Lieutenant | John H. Trumbull |
| Preceded by | Charles A. Templeton |
| Succeeded by | John H. Trumbull |
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| In office 1923 – 1925 |
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| Governor | Charles A. Templeton |
| Preceded by | Charles A. Templeton |
| Succeeded by | John H. Trumbull |
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| Born | November 19, 1875 Honolulu, Hawaii |
| Died | June 6, 1956 Washington, D.C. |
| Nationality | U.S. |
| Political party | Republican |
| Spouse | 1) Alfreda Mitchell (div.) 2) Suzanne Carroll Hill |
| Religion | Protestant Christian |
Hiram Bingham, formally Hiram Bingham III, (November 19, 1875 – June 6, 1956) was an American academic, explorer and politician. He rediscovered the Inca settlement of Machu Picchu in 1911. Later, Bingham served as Governor of Connecticut and a member of the United States Senate.
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[edit] Early life
Bingham was born in Honolulu, Hawai'i, to Hiram Bingham II (1831-1908), an early Protestant missionary to the Kingdom of Hawai'i, the grandson of Hiram Bingham I (1789–1869), another missionary. He attended O'ahu College, now known as Punahou School in Hawai'i from 1882 to 1892. He returned to the United States in his teens in order to complete his education, entering Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, from which he graduated in 1894. He obtained a degree from Yale University in 1898, a degree from the University of California, Berkeley in 1900, and a degree from Harvard University in 1905. While at University, Bingham was a member of Acacia Fraternity. He taught history and politics at Harvard and then served as preceptor under Woodrow Wilson at Princeton University. In 1907, Yale University appointed Bingham III as a lecturer in South American history.
[edit] Archaeology
It was during Bingham's time as a lecturer — later professor — at Yale that he discovered the largely forgotten Incan city of Machu Picchu. In 1908, he had served as 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).
Bingham was thrilled by the prospect of unexplored Incan cities, and in 1911 returned to the Andes with the Yale Peruvian Expedition of 1911. On 24 July 1911, Melchor Arteaga led Bingham to Machu Picchu, which had been largely forgotten by everybody except the small number of people living in the immediate valley (possibly including two local missionaries named Thomas Paine and Stuart McNairn whose descendants claim that they had already climbed to the ruins in 1906).
Bingham returned to Peru in 1912 and 1915 with the support of Yale and the National Geographic Society.
Machu Picchu has become one of the major tourist attractions in South America, and Bingham is recognized as the man who brought the site to world attention, although many others contributed to the archaeological resurrection of the site. The switchback-filled road that carries tourist buses to the site from the Urubamba River is called the Hiram Bingham Highway.
Bingham has been cited as one possible basis for the 'Indiana Jones' character, [1]. His book Lost City of the Incas became a bestseller upon its publication in 1948. [2]
Peru has long sought the return of the estimated 40,000 artifacts, including mummies, ceramics and bones, Bingham had removed from the Machu Picchu site. On 14 September, 2007, an agreement was made between Yale University and the Peruvian government for the return of the objects.[1] though on April 12, 2008 the Peruvian government stated that they had revised previous estimates of 4,000 pieces up to 40,000.[3]
[edit] Marriage and family
He married Alfreda Mitchell, granddaughter of Charles L. Tiffany, on November 20, 1899, and had seven sons, including Jonathan Brewster Bingham (1914-1986), who served as a Democrat in Congress; diplomat and World War II hero Hiram Bingham IV (1903-1988); Charles Tiffany (1906-1993) (physician), Brewster (1908-1995) (minister), Mitchell (1910-1994) (artist), Woodbridge (1901-1986) (professor) and Alfred Mitchell Bingham (1905-1998) (lawyer). After a divorce he married Suzanne Carroll Hill in June of 1937. Hiram has a grand daughter named Whitney Bingham who is currently a student at Jakarta International School, located in Jakarta, Indonesia.
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."
[edit] 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. He served the Aviation Section of the United States Army Signal Corps and attained the rank of lieutenant colonel. In Issoudun, France, Bingham commanded a flying school.
[edit] Politics
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, the shortest term of any Connecticut Governor.
Bingham was reelected to a full six-year term in the Senate in 1926.
Senator Bingham was Chairman of the Committee on Printing and then Chairman of the Committee on Territories and Insular Possessions. In 1929, Bingham was censured by the Senate on charges that he had placed a lobbyist on his payroll.
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 Great Depression and left the Senate at the end of his second term in 1933. [2]
During World War II, Bingham lectured at several United States Navy training schools. In 1951, Bingham was appointed Chairman of the Civil Service Commission Loyalty Review Board, an assignment he kept through 1953.
[edit] Death
On June 6, 1956, Bingham died at his Washington, D.C. home. He was interred at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia.
[edit] References
- ^ "<The trail less trampled on" in USA Today by Gene Sloan, September 23, 2005: "The iconic mountaintop citadel, discovered less than a century ago by American explorer Hiram Bingham, the inspiration for Indiana Jones, is a thrilling reward after days of exertion."
- ^ Lost City of the Incas biographical profile from the United States Senate website
- ^ Perú en reclamo por Machu Picchu
3. Portrait of an Explorer , biography of Bingham by his son Alfred, Iowa State University Press, Ames, 1989. ISBN 0-8138-0136-2.
4. Eternity in their Hearts by Don Richardson, Regal Books, Ventura, CA, 1981. ISBN 0-8307-0925-8, pages 34-35. and is known for discovering macu pichu
[edit] External links
- Works by Hiram Bingham at Project Gutenberg
- Works by Hiram Bingham at Internet Archive
- Works by Hiram Bingham at Google Books
- Selection from Bingham's The Lost City of the Incas
- Machu Picchu on the Web - The Discovery
- Inca Land, by Hiram Bingham
| Preceded by Frank Bosworth Brandegee |
United States Senator (Class 3) from Connecticut 1924–1933 Served alongside: Frederick Walcott |
Succeeded by Augustine Lonergan |
| Preceded by Charles A. Templeton |
Governor of Connecticut 1925 |
Succeeded by John H. Trumbull |
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