Quincy, Mass. Historical and Architectural Survey

68-72 Atlantic Street

HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE
The Atlantic neighborhood in North Quincy is bordered, by the Neponset River to the North and Quincy Bay to the East. It was once part of Dorchester and with the Old North Precinct that had split off from Braintree, became part of the Town of Quincy in 1792. The Jockey Club of Boston set up the first mile track course in the state in 1812 in a section of Atlantic known as Billings Plains and less than one hundred years later the track was filled in with new homes. Like its neighbors, Montclair and Wollaston, most of the community of Atlantic was built in the first third of the 20th century. For nearly 200 years North Quincy was referred to as "The Farms" and it was such as the Newbury, Wilson, Billings' and Glover farms that were split up for residences by real estate developers David H. MacKay, Henry Hunt, Maurice E. Kilpatrick, John E. Poland, Henry J. Grass and Charles M. Conant, Henry Blackwell, and Walter Webb. The development process was greatly accelerated by the Old Colony Railroad which began operations in 1845. eventually establishing stations in Atlantic, Norfolk Downs (the southern section of Atlantic), and Wollaston as well as by the advent of Quincy's extensive street railway system.

Local contractor Alexander Darr built the four-family residence at 68-72 Atlantic Street in 1928 for a cost of $10,000 employing local builder Ernest Morris to do the actual construction. Built on the former farm of Chase Parker, there is no evidence that Darr and his wife, Minnie G., who listed their residence as 24 Walnut Street, also in Atlantic, ever lived here. Darr probably considered 68-72 Atlantic Street a sound investment in the rapidly expanding Atlantic neighborhood.

BIBLIOGRAPHY and/or REFERENCES
Assessors Records.
Building Permits.
H. Hobart Holly, Quincy Historical Society.
H. Hobart Holly, ed. Quincy: 350 Years, 1974, p. 4.
William S. Pattee, A History of Old Braintree and Quincy, 1878, p. 55.
John Ramsdell. "Historic North Quincy". ["Written about 1934] . Typed manuscript at Quincy
Historical Society.
Daniel Munro Wilson, Three Hundred Years of Quincy 1625-1925, 1925, p. 280-281.

ARCHITECTURAL SIGNIFICANCE:
Quincy has many fine apartment buildings which are traditionally designed and residentially scaled. Some of the larger ones are built of brick, while the smaller ones, described as "multiple residences" often in the midst of a residential area, are constructed of wood and usually in an expanded version of the predominant house style. The multiple residence (four apartments) at 68-72 Atlantic Street represents one of the latter types. Built at the height of the Colonial Revival Period, it a two story wood structure with a large gambrel roof whose lower slope is filled with a shed dormer encompassing the length of the building. Pleasing details include the two pedimented porticos supported by two columns and the regular fenestration consisting of triple windows. It is a fine traditional building of its time and a good example of multiple housing in Quincy of the 1920s.

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