The excitement that surrounded moving out of the old Willard Court House on Court Street, described by one old Boston attorney as "gray and gloomy, and resembling the French Bastille [1]," was noticeable in the early 1890s as the new Court House started to receive its new tenants. People who were to work in the Court House responded positively.

Chief Justice Walbridge Abner Field of the Supreme Judicial Court commented that the chambers were "ample and have been found to be very well adapted to the transaction of the business of the court." Supreme Judicial Court Clerk for the Commonwealth Henry A. Clapp said the rooms "are handsome, well warmed and lighted, convenient for Bench and Bar alike and the furniture and fixtures all that could be desired." Reporter of Decisions George F. Tucker was the most enthusiastic: "It is a pleasure-almost an inspiration-to work in rooms so well lighted and airy." [2]

But from the architectural and cultural community of Boston at large, there was only criticism of the Court House.

Noted American architect Ralph Adams Cram, as a twenty-one year old budding architect, had won through to the next to last round of the Court House design competition in 1885, when the last round was suddenly cancelled and the job arbitrarily awarded to City Architect George Clough.[3] He later considered that during the 1880s in Boston, "terrible things began to happen, e.g. the Northerly addition to the State House, the Court House . . . ."[4] Cram put into print his utter disgust for the Court House by describing the building, along with the first State House addition as "the last gasp of an expiring barbarism." [5]

Walter Muir Whitehill, author and longtime director of the nearby Boston Athenaeum, lamented the transformation of once stately Pemberton Square by the construction of the new building. He described the Court House as being "plumped down in the region, obliterating all sense of proportion." [6]

Footnotes:
[1] SAMUEL LELAND POWERS, PORTRAITS OF A HALF CENTURY 69 (1925).
[2] REPORTS OF PROCEEDINGS OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF BOSTON FOR THE YEAR 212 (City of Boston 1894).
[3] DOUGLAS SHAND-TUCCI, BOSTON BOHEMIA 1881-1900, at 10 (1995).
[4] Ralph Adams Cram, Architecture, in FIFTY YEARS OF BOSTON: A MEMORIAL VOLUME 341 (Elizabeth M. Herlihy ed. 1932).
[5] Id. at 342.
[6] WALTER MUIR WHITEHILL, BOSTON: A TOPOGRAPHICAL HISTORY 110 (3rd ed. 2000).