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Born on September 3, 1856, Boston, MA
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Sullivan studied in public schools in Boston, and spent considerable time on his grandparents’ farm in South Reading. When his parents transferred to Chicago in 1869, he preferred to remain with his grandparents.
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Returning to Chicago in 1875, Sullivan became a draftsman with Joseph S. Johnston & John Edelman. He designed the interior decorative "fresco secco" stencils (stencil applied on dry plaster) of the Moody Tabernacle.
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In the 1890s, the partners designed The Schiller Building, the Chicago Stock Exchange Building, the Guaranty or Prudential Building, New York, and the Carson Pirie Scott Department Store, Chicago.
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His masterpiece, the Wainwright Tomb, a mausoleum in Bellefontaine Cemetery in St. Louis, constructed for Charlotte Dickson Wainwright in 1892, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and became a St. Louis Landmark.
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When business declined owing to the Panic of 1893, a serious economic depression in America, the two partners broke up. Sullivan faced severe financial problems, compounded by his alcoholism and unfriendly behavior.
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In 1899, he married Mary Azona Hattabaugh, known as Margaret, a 27-year-old divorcee, fifteen years younger than him. She left him 10 years later - the couple was childless.
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The Merchants’ National Bank in Grinnell, Iowa, completed in1914, has a relatively serious form, with intricate ornament. His last project was the facade for the Krause Music Store in Chicago, eight years later.
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In 1924, his autobiographical work, ‘The Autobiography of an Idea’, describing his childhood, and early career, and 19 plates for A System of Architectural Ornament According with a Philosophy of Man’s Powers, were published.
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Louis died on April 14, 1924, Chicago, IL.
