Hiram Bingham III

**Hiram Bingham III** was a real person. In Leigh Bardugo's Alex Stern series, Hiram Bingham III was involved in the occult activities of Yale University's Houses of the Veil. When the societies were at risk of disbandment from the university in 1898, Hiram Bingham III along with Edward Harkness and William Payne Whitney joined together to found Lethe House as an oversight body.

## Biography

### Founding of Lethe

Hiram Bingham III attended Yale University and was a member of the now-defunct Acacia Fraternity. In 1898, he joined with Edward Harkness of Wolf's Head and William Payne Whitney of Skull and Bones to establish the 'League of Lethe.'

From the earliest meetings, Lethe was meant to be an oversight body for the societies occult activities, monitoring their arcane practices to keep citizens and students safe, and to ensure amicable relations between the Houses of the Veil and the University.

### Excavation of Machu Picchu

Lethe delegates were empowered by the storehouse of arcane knowledge collected for their disposal. This storehouse significantly increased with Hiram Bingham's excavation of Machu Picchu in 1911. Hiram brought Machu Picchu to global attention after he visited it with the help of local Peruvian farmers. Bingham stole forty thousand artifacts, bringing them back to Yale to be studied at the Peabody museum. Although he claimed the artifacts would be brought back in 18 months, it would take one hundred years for the repatriation of these artifacts to Peru to take place.

The golden crucible, called Hiram's Crucible, was not turned into the university and documented, but to Lethe House where it remains. Hiram's Crucible is key in brewing Orozcerio, which enabled Lethe delegates to see and banish Grays and ensure the stability of the societies' rites.

### Legacy

Hiram Bingham III had a bust of his likeness in Il Bastone. Unfortunately, the bust mostly looked like a perturbed department store mannequin.

## Personal Attributes

### Physical Description

Bingham, in the peak of his life at Lethe, had boyish features and a downturned mouth.

## Real Life Information

### Biography

Hiram Bingham III grew up in Hawaii as the grandson of a Christian missionary and colonizer Hiram Bingham I. Bingham III would go on to study at Yale and later serve as Yale's lecturer on South American History. Although not a trained archeologist, Bingham made public the existence of the Inca citadel of Machu Picchu in 1911 with the guidance of local indigenous farmers. As stated in Ninth House, Bingham excavated and exported 40 thousand artifacts, including mummies, ceramics, and bones from Machu Picchu, which wasn't returned to Peru until 2007.

During World War I, Bingham became an aviator and eventually provided ground school training for aviation cadets. From serving, he attained the rank of lieutenant colonel. In 1924, he was elected governor of Connecticut although his term would be cut short with when in December 1924, Bingham was also elected as a Republican to serve in the United States Senate to fill a vacancy created by a suicide of the former senator. Bingham would die in 1956, age 80.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Ninth House Chapter 3 (Winter)
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Ninth House Chapter 4 (Last Fall)
3. ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiram\_Bingham\_I
4. ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiram\_Bingham\_III