Explorer

Peter Gorman's love affair with the Amazon jungle is well known to people in the field. Since 1984, Mr. Gorman has spent a minimum of three months annually there--as well as all of 1998-2000--generally using Iquitos, Peru as his base of operations. 

During that time he has studied ayahuasca, the legendary visionary and healing drink of the jungle, with his friend, the late curandero Julio Jerena, as well as the San Pedro, the sacred cactus of the highlands, with the healer Victor Estrada. 

He has also collected botanical specimens for Shaman Pharmaceuticals and herpetological specimens for the FIDIA Research Institute of the University of Rome.

He was the first person to ever work with the medicinal knowledge of the remote Matses Indians of the Peruvian-Brazilian border, and his description of their use of the secretions of the phyllomedusa bicolor frog has opened an entire field devoted to the use of amphibian peptides as potential medicines in Western medicine. (His initial writing on the effects of the secretions is the first description of a human taking an animal substance directly into the bloodstream ever recorded.) His work with the phyllomedusa bicolor has been the subject of an article in Science magazine and several scientific journals; his work in Peru in general was the subject of a Newsweek feature, a recent Men’s Journal feature and numerous other newspaper and magazine articles 

He has also collected artifacts from the Matses for the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, several of which are on permanent display in that museum's Hall of South American Peoples. 

In 1997, Mr. Gorman and his wife Gilma discovered the only fossil bed ever found in the Iquitos area. Their preliminary dig exposed three identifiable animal fossils dating from 3-30 million years old when examined by the Department of Paleontology at the American Museum of Natural History. They are currently working on funding to have it properly explored. 

To do his work in Peru, over the years Peter Gorman has rebuilt several boats, traveled thousands of miles of jungle waterways, hiked across the Peruvian jungle on numerous occasions, suffered from malaria and a botfly infestation, been bitten by ants, rats, spiders, vampire bats and other scary things, and generally had a rollicking good time with it all. Penthouse magazine once referred to one of his expeditions as rivaling "a real Indiana Jones' adventure." 

Speaker

As a speaker, Mr. Gorman has lectured at the Boston Museum of Science, the New York Open Center, at Axiom and Mind/Biz/Spirit conferences, and has been a featured speaker at every Shamanism Conference held annually in Iquitos, Peru. He has appeared as a guest on numerous television shows, in several documentaries and on hundreds of radio shows, including an all-nighter with Art Bell.

Book him as a speaker: Contact

Peter Gorman, 7th International Amazonian Shamanism Conferance, 2011 - Iquitos, Peru

Naturalist

It would probably surprise a lot of people to know that much of Queens, New York was swamp and farmland well into the early 1960s; that growing up in Whitestone, Queens meant having rabbits, pheasants, black snakes, tortoises and even an occasional possum show up in the backyard. Digging up arrowheads at nearby Dupey's field was not unheard of. My kids call it the old days and laugh when I tell them that St. Lukes grammer school had classes that ranged from 79-106 kids each. No wonder the nuns used the stick. 

Growing up there an affinity for nature came easily. I fought it, of course, wanting to be a city boy and a tough guy, but the early lure had sunk deeply into me and by age 20 I found myself hitchhiking all over the country, mostly in the wide open spaces. I logged over 50,000 hitching miles, a good number. 

From there it was trips into Mexico's jungles in the south, and when I once got caught in quicksand near the coast I was hooked forever. It didn't take long to find myself in the Amazon where by luck I ran into the great naturalist and guide Moises Torres Vienna. He took me under his wing and taught me as much about that strange, exotic and wonderful world as I could stand to learn. He walked me hundreds of miles all told, introduced me to remote indigenous communities and brought me to an old curandero, Julio Jerena, who became my teacher and taught me about ayahuasca, the legendary curative of the Amazon, for more than 20 years until his death in January, 2007.

It's been a good trip.