Lawrence C. Dame (1898-1981) grew up in an affluent Portland family. After serving in World War I on the home front and in France, he attended Harvard. During the 1920s, he worked as a crime reporter for the Portland Press Herald and Evening Express.

Beginning in the 1930s, he traveled to Europe and throughout North America, gaining a reputation as an adventurer. Around 1940, he joined an expedition searching for a “lost city” in the Yucatan. He authored several books, including Yucatan (1941) about his experience in Mexico. In later life, he continued his journalism career in Massachusetts, primarily working as an art critic.