Mary Eva Hird acquired her sense of wanderlust from her father, Samuel Hird. The Hird family traveled frequently and Samuel never liked to visit the same place twice. A trip to Egypt and Palestine was a turning point for Mary, inspiring several spontaneous international trips during the course of her adult life.

Mary (known as "Eva") never married. She attended the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts (PAFA) sporadically between 1893-1899 when the Hird family lived in Mt. Airy, Pennsylvania and Passaic, New Jersey. By 1928 when Mary created this Lake Como scene, her parents and closest sister had passed away, diminishing the companionship she experienced on past excursions.