April 25 1895:
The architects, Mckim, Mead, and White, gave a reception this evening in their beautiful Public Library to Abbot and Sargent, the painters, whose decorative work was unveiled for the first time. There were two hundred guests, men and women, forty of whom came over from New York for the night. It was a splendid affair of brilliant jewels and costumes which can never be repeated, for the building now becomes the People's Palace, making further fashinable exclusion there impossible. An orchestra played on the landing of the marble staircase, up and down which the pretty women strolled in all their glory of satin, lace, and diamonds. It happened to be a very worm night, and through the open windows of the court the fountain flashed and sparkled, throwing its tallest jet almost to the roof....
Sullivan, grandson of General John Sullivan, was a gentlman, playwright, former tutor to Henry Cabot Lodge, something of a dandy and social hanger-on.