Hiram Bingham reached Machu Picchu and brought it to world attention

On July 24, 1911, Hiram Bingham, a Yale University history lecturer leading a Peruvian expedition, climbed a steep ridge above the Urubamba valley and reached the Inca citadel of Machu Picchu. He was not searching for it — his goal was Vilcabamba, the last Inca stronghold.

The day before, a local farmer named Melchor Arteaga had told the party of ruins atop a nearby mountain. In cold drizzle, Bingham pressed on with Arteaga and a guide, crossed a flimsy bridge, and was led the final stretch by a young boy to terraces, temples and palaces choked with jungle.

Machu Picchu’s existence had long been known to the families living in the valley below.

Bingham did not “discover” the site — Indigenous residents had never lost it — but his photographs, published by National Geographic in 1913, carried it to a global audience. A larger Yale expedition returned in 1912 to clear and map the ruins in earnest.