Own Home Is Lost By "Home Mender"

1920 (Click graphic for bigger)

MRS. DANIEL F. SULLIVAN AND HER WAIFS.

Don't for a moment think that the babies in the arms of Mrs. Daniel F. Sullivan in the above picture are all the "family" of "waifs" she has adopted. No, no! These are just all she could hold of the scores of infants she has made happy in her luxurious home. But now Mrs. Sullivan faces the loss of that home thru the alleged desertion of her husband. She is suing for divorce and alimony on those grounds.

WOMEN WHO HELPED WAIFS DESERTED BY MATE.

Is Now Alone After Having Helped Needy of City for Three Years.

One, who for three years has made the homes of others bright and cheerful, today finds herself without a home.

Hungry urchins and needy families came to her when in distress and found solace and food.

And now Mrs. Daniel L. Sullivan of Chicago has lost her own home in the process.

She established the fact when she filed action for divorce against her wealthy husband, who was first interested in her charitable project and then bored to distraction and desertion.

It was in seeking for a suitable memorial for her son, McKenzie Lowndes, that Mrs. Sullivan decided to bring the suffering children of poor parents into the beautiful Sullivan home in Chicago. She began with five and there were times when she had fifty.

She Made Them Happy.

They were fed, dressed well, given toys and medical attention and when they were quite happy Mrs. Sullivan usually took steps to return them to their own home, made materially comfortable for their home-coming.

Mrs. Sullivan began plans to make it a permanent institution, encouraged by thousands of letters commending her work or thanking her for priceless aid to individuals. Her husband was worth nearly a half million dollars, the home was ideally located and fitted for the charity and the routine of "trouble seeking" had been established. Families in misery knew where to apply.

Then, just as the organization was to be enlarged and the work amplified, Mrs. Sullivan received a telephone message from her husband to have dinner with him. She kept the appointment and waited for hours, but when she finally returned to her home she found a note pinned to her dresser in which Mr. Sullivan explained that he had left the house forever.

Three times thereafter Mr. Sullivan returned for brief visits, but for a year he has not even communicated with his wife.

Mr. Sullivan went away for the last time late in 1918.

Foundlings Brought Her Trouble.

Mrs. Sullivan states in her bill of particulars that she was married at Milwaukee, Aug. 21, 1911, and that for years she lived very happily with her husband. The beginning of their troubles came one year after Mrs. Sullivan had taken in the first foundling in the endeavor which subsequently made her known and loved thruout the poor sections of the city.

The plan for making the memorial a charity on a great scale has failed with the absence of Mr. Sullivan, but "the mender of broken homes" is still active in a limited sphere along the same lines proposed at the time of her own problem's development.

In her action Mrs. Sullivan will ask substantial alimony, contending that her husband is worth at least $300,000 and has an income of not less than $30,000 a year.

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Aug. 7, 1920, p. 4.