[3] Cornelia Fassett spent three years in both Paris and Rome studying under Giuseppe Castiglione, Henri Fantin La Tour, and Lambert Joseph Matthew.

After an early career in Chicago, Fassett and her husband moved to Washington, D.C., in 1875, where she painted successful documentary portraits of notable government figures and he was photographer to the Supervising Architect of the Treasury.

A year after their move, her 1876 group portrait of the Supreme Court justices was exhibited at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition.

[3] Fassett used Martha J. Lamb's home library, to showcase the literary figure, sitting her among stacks of books and Renaissance furnishings.

[6] In 1886, a writer for the New York Column, "Gossip of Noted Ladies" mentions that "One of the striking features of the study is a beautiful painting by Mrs. Fassett of Washington representing its interior and Mrs. Lamb seated in a large crimson armchair which throws into capital relief her fine face and handsome figure."

Originally the painting was exhibited at the National Academy of Design in 1878, but later moved to the New York Historical Society, where it remains today.