Inez Robie Patterson, born in 1911 in Chester, Pennsylvania, was a standout athlete who won six first-place finishes at a 1927 swim meet in South Philadelphia. At 18 she began a Girls in Sports column in the Philadelphia Tribune, the city's historically Black newspaper, urging Black girls to join swimming clubs and learn lifesaving. Segregated pools were common in the era, and access for Black swimmers was often limited to a single hour. Patterson insisted on swimming when her white teammates did, rather than accepting that restricted slot. Later she became a swimming official, and a 1942 Tribune report calls her the first Black woman to become a US swimming official.

Hampi is a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Karnataka, India, with more than 1,600 surviving remains spread over 4,100 hectares. It was the capital of the Vijayanagara Empire from 1336 to 1565. Travellers from Persia and Portugal described it as a prosperous, wealthy and grand city with temples, markets and farms along the Tungabhadra River. By 1500 it was estimated to be the world's second-largest city after Beijing, and probably India's richest at the time. In 1565 a coalition of Muslim sultanates defeated the Vijayanagara Empire, its capital was conquered and destroyed, and the city was left in ruins. Hampi remains a religious centre, with the active Virupaksha Temple at its heart.