This site explains how Hiram Bingham IV had a hand -- a big one -- in granting visas to more than 1,000 Jews who were being persecuted by the Nazis in the early 1940s.

I came about this through a combination of things. One, Bingham Tract, located not far from where I grew up (and live) is named after the first Bingham, a missionary to Hawaii. Second, on one of the marathon episodes of Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations (Travel Channel), he refers to Hiram Bingham III, grandson of the original who grew up in Honolulu, was educated at Yale and went on to see Machu Picchu in the mountains of Peru.

Quite an amazing family. They got around. I still think, though, that the best job on Earth belongs to Bourdain.

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