One of the first photos of Machu Picchu, taken by the man who “discovered” it (Info in comments) [1284×1690]

The year was 1911.

A college professor/armchair archaeologist some have called “The Real Life Indiana Jones” followed a set of clues and was led to Machu Picchu…now one of the 7 New Wonders of the World.

He’s often credited with “discovering” the old city, even though people were already living there at the time. How do you discover a place people already knew about? Well…you don’t.

That man, Hiram Bingham, took this picture with a camera he’d convinced the owner of Kodak to give him, in exchange for “exposure.” He was the original social media influencer.

After visiting Machu Picchu last year, I spent about nine months researching the guy. This didn’t just involve reading books on the topic, but going through his private letters, now held by Yale. I even got them to scan some in for me. All I had to do was ask. Who knew?

I did this because I wanted to make a video on the subject, which I finally finished. Is nine months too long for something like this? Yes. Was it a good use of my time? Probably not. I’ll link it down at the bottom for those who are interested. If not, here’s the somewhat-brief-version:

Ok, that’s a huge lie. I can’t be brief with anything.

**Mr. Missionary**

Hiram Bingham was raised by Hawaiian missionaries; the kind who tried to wipe out the local culture, and helped lay the foundations for overthrowing the kingdom. Like, the real kind of nasty “Christians” you hear about. I mean, I don’t know them. Maybe they were nice people. But probably not.

You might think this made Hiram one of those shitty colonizer types who stumbled around South America exploiting the locals and stealing everything he could get his hands on, but that was far from the truth. We aren’t talking about Belloq here.

He married an heir to the Tiffany fortune, but was hellbent on writing his own story. I know you think this sounds like BS, but I honestly don’t think he was that interested in the Tiffany money. Hiram didn’t just want to be rich and famous, he wanted to be respected.

He found an interest in Latin American history, and eventually became a professor at Yale. On his third trip to South America, he visited a number of Inca sites in Peru. He was like “Holy shit, this stuff is amazing,” because the topic was largely ignored in academic circles at the time.

**Instagram Influencer**

After returning home, he put his influencer skills to work as he planned an expedition. Not only did he hit up everyone he could find for donations, but he sent out letters to all sorts of companies, asking for free stuff in exchange for exposure. I guess it was a new concept back then, because it worked.

This included getting discounts on gear from Abercrombie & Fitch. Did you know they were once a respected company that sold stuff for outdoorsmen, instead of clothes made in Bangladesh for emaciated models? Me neither.

He also got a few Kodak cameras, as well as a ton of film and advice on how to frame up his shots properly and develop the film himself. Can you imagine a time when you could just fire off a letter to a dude who owns a giant company and not only does he respond, but he gives you tips?

In Peru, Hiram searched for clues. What he was actually looking for was the lost city of Vilcabamba, the last refuge of the Inca after the Spanish invaded; but he was more than happy to investigate most anything he heard of. I mean, he didn’t really care *what* he found, as long as it was cool.

He’s led up the side of a mountain by a local guy, who pushes him off on a small boy who leads him to some ruins: Machu Picchu. Some farmers were living there, growing crops on the old terraces. Hiram was moderately interested and took some photos, but quickly left and continued on with his journey.

Which…yeah. It’s completely bizarre. I think it just didn’t quite register that he’d “found” what he did. As you can see in the picture, the site was overgrown.

**Mr. Magazine**

When he got home, he gave a presentation to the National Geographic Society, and gained the interest of the magazine’s editor. He was fascinated by Hiram’s photos, and helped sponsor another expedition.

This time, Hiram hired some locals to clear the site and took way more pictures (with some new free gear he scored from Kodak). This resulted in a massive double issue of National Geographic, focused solely on him and on Peru.

The issue swept the world, and Hiram was credited with “discovering” the site. And though he’d come to later embellish the story a bit when it came to how he felt when he first saw it, he never really strayed from the core of the story and how he was led there.

Later, he was accused of stealing gold, and some even called him a murderer for supposedly drowning a guy who’d visited Machu Picchu before him. It’s too much to explain in a Reddit comment with a character limit, but it also ties in with a controversy surrounding artifacts uncovered at Machu Picchu and sent back to Yale.

Was Hiram as bad as you might think? Probably not, but I’ll leave that up to you. All the evidence is [laid out in the video, which I’m linking here.](https://youtube.com/watch?v=rHZEJw4Hj7o&pp=iggCQAE%3D)

Fair warning, it’s 80 minutes long. I think the amount of effort I put into the editing is evident, but you may not want to start it unless you’ve got the time. My only request is that if you *do* watch, you open it in the YouTube app or watch it on your TV or something. YouTube kind of sucks sometimes and tries to push the low resolution version on you if you’re using the (horrible) reddit app.

I didn’t intend to make what’s basically a full-blown documentary. It kind of sounds pretentious to even call it that. I originally thought “It’d be interesting to make a video on Hiram, and another one about Machu Picchu,” but there’s more I got into it…well. You see what happened.

It gets into far more details than I’ve been able to write here, including his run-in with Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, his meeting with Teddy Roosevelt, what he erased from the site, as well as what Machu Picchu was and how the Spanish conquered the entire empire with less than 200 men. All I’ll say is that if you want to be pissed at someone, be pissed at the conquistadors a. Hiram…not so much.

The great irony of OPs seething ‘documentary’ self-promotion is that the only reason they went to Machu Picchu is because Bingham ‘discovered’ it. Did people know there was some ancient ruins there? Sure. Would OP have ever heard of it, known details about it, been able to research it, or had it turn into a tourist attraction they could reasonable visit without the evil Bingham pretending to discover it? Not a chance. It would be a foliage covered ruin in the mountains that no one outside the local region knows about.