The Ryukyu Islands (琉球諸島, Ryūkyū-shotō^?), known in Japanese as the Nansei Islands (南西諸島, Nansei-shotō^?, lit. "Southwest Islands") and also known as the Ryukyu Arc (琉球弧, Ryūkyū-ko^?), are a chain of Japanese islands that stretch southwest from Kyushu to Taiwan: the Ōsumi, Tokara, Amami, Okinawa, and Sakishima (Miyako and Yaeyama) islands, with Yonaguni the southernmost. The largest of the islands is Okinawa.

The islands have a subtropical climate with mild winters and hot summers. Precipitation is very high, and is affected by the rainy season and typhoons. Except the outlying Daitō Islands, the island chain has two major geologic boundaries, the Tokara Strait between the Tokara and Amami Islands, and the Kerama Gap between the Okinawa and Miyako Islands, dividing the islands into the Northern, Central, and Southern Ryukyus.

The northern Ryukyus fall under the cultural sphere of Kyūshū; the people are ethnically Japanese and speak the Osumi (Kagoshima) dialect of Japanese. The central and southern islands are characterized by coral reefs. The native population are collectively called Ryukyuans, and show a great degree of internal diversity. They speak the Ryukyuan languages, which are native to each island and distinct from one another. The outlying Daitō Islands were uninhabited until the Meiji period, when their development was started mainly by people from the Izu Islands south of Tokyo, and speak a Hachijo dialect.

Ernest Taylor Pyle (August 3, 1900 – April 18, 1945) was an American journalist who wrote as a roving correspondent for the Scripps Howard newspaper chain from 1935 until his death in combat during World War II. He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1944. His articles, about the out-of-the-way places he visited and the people who lived there, were written in a folksy style, much like a personal letter to a friend. He enjoyed a following in some 300 newspapers.

Pyle was born on a tenant farm near Dana, Indiana on August 3, 1900. When he was almost 18, he joined the United States Navy Reserve. World War I ended soon after, so Pyle served for only three months.

After the war, Pyle attended Indiana University, traveled to the Orient with his fraternity brothers of Sigma Alpha Epsilon, and edited the student newspaper. However, he didn't graduate and instead, with only a semester left at Indiana, he accepted a job at a paper in LaPorte, Indiana. He worked there for three months before moving to Washington, D.C. A tabloid newspaper, The Washington Daily News, founded in 1921, had hired Pyle as a reporter. All of the editors were young, including Editor-in-Chief John M. Gleissner (one of Warren G. Harding's drinking buddies); Lee G. Miller (author of An Ernie Pyle Album – Indiana to Ie Shima); Charles M. Egan, Willis "June" Thornton; and Paul McCrea. Pyle was named managing editor of the Washington Daily News and served in the post for three years, all the while fretting that he was unable to do any writing.