Oliver Hazard Perry La Farge II was an American writer and anthropologist. In 1925 he explored early Olmec sites in Mexico, and later studied additional sites in Central America and the American Southwest. In addition to more than 15 scholarly works, mostly about Native Americans, he wrote several novels, including the Pulitzer Prize-winning Laughing Boy (1929). La Farge also wrote and published short stories, in magazines such as The New Yorker and Esquire.

The Olmecs were the earliest known major Mesoamerican civilization. Following a progressive development in Soconusco, they occupied the tropical lowlands of the modern-day Mexican states of Veracruz and Tabasco. It has been speculated that the Olmecs derived in part from the neighboring Mokaya or Mixe–Zoque cultures.