Douglas Eugene "Gene" Savoy (May 11, 1927 – September 11, 2007) was an American explorer, author, religious leader, and theologian. He served as Head Bishop of the International Community of Christ, Church of the Second Advent from 1971 until his death. Rising to prominence as one of the premier explorers of Peru in the 1960s, he is best known for his claims to have discovered more than 40 lost cities in Peru and is credited with bringing to light a number of Peru’s most important archeological sites, including Vilcabamba, the last refuge of the Incas during the Spanish conquest, and Gran Pajaten, which he named but did not discover.
Early life
Savoy was born in Bellingham, Washington. At age 17 he enlisted in the U.S. Navy and served two years during World War II, after which he enrolled at the University of Portland to begin studies for the priesthood. Following an incident when one of his professors told him that the ideas he expressed in one of his papers were "very close to heresy," Savoy went to see the dean of men and legendary counselor, Monsignor John B. Delaunay, who told Savoy that he reminded him of Teilhard de Chardin and, recognizing that Savoy had some mission to perform, encouraged Savoy to take off a year to "follow his heart" and pursue his studies privately rather than remain in school.
Initially shocked by this advice, Savoy went on to work as a journalist for the next ten years while he continued his studies of regional Indian petroglyphs and of religion. During those years, he spent much of his time studying the literature, legends, and folklore of the North American Indians in the Pacific Northwest, intrigued by the possibility that there may have been early contacts between North and South America. He also studied mystic Judaism and Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism, Zoroastrianism, the Chinese classics, and the Gnostic writings during that time under direct disciples of Khalil Gibran and Paul Brunton.
In 1956 Savoy’s life changed utterly. His business collapsed and took with it his home, his belongings, and his marriage. As luck would have it, however, his documentary film of Columbia Gorge petroglyphs and carvings was picked up by a national news service, and his theories about similarities between North and South American picture drawings attracted the attention of an American archeologist who offered to take Savoy on an expedition to Peru as a photographer. Eager to fulfill his dream of becoming an explorer, Savoy accepted. In 1957 Savoy moved to Peru and a few years later began to organize his own archaeological expeditions under the auspices of the Andean Explorers Club, which he founded and which later grew into the Andean Explorers Foundation & Ocean Sailing Club.
Explorer
Throughout the 1960s, Savoy carried out a series of well publicized expeditions in Peru, exploring and documenting various pre-Columbian archaeological sites. In 1964 he identified a ruin called Espiritu Pampa as the legendary Vilcabamba, the 16th century capital of the Neo-Inca Empire and the last refuge of the Incas during the Spanish conquest. This discovery disproved Hiram Bingham’s belief that Machu Picchu and Vilcabamba were one and the same. In 1965 Savoy explored and brought worldwide attention to a site he named Gran Pajatén, an ornately ornamented stone city located in northeastern Peru. His discovery of this site, as well as Vilcabamba and other sites, is disputed. From 1965 to 1970 he continued his explorations into Peru’s eastern montañas.
In 1969 Savoy built and captained the Kuviqu (also known as the "Feathered Serpent I"), a totora-reed raft of ancient design, along 2,000 miles of ocean coastline from Peru to Mesoamerica in an effort to prove that Peruvians and Mexicans could have maintained contact in ancient times and that the legendary heroes Viracocha and Quetzalcoatl were one and the same. Soon afterwards he captained the "Feathered Serpent II", which he sailed from the United States to the Caribbean, to Central and South America, and finally to Hawaii, to study ocean and wind currents. In 1997 he sailed a 73-foot wooden catamaran from Peru to Hawaii in a dramatic effort to demonstrate that ancient Peruvians could have sailed the open seas.
Savoy returned to the United States in the early 1970s, but continued his explorations throughout the latter half of the 20th century.