Quincy, Mass. Historical and Architectural Survey

139-141 Clay Street

HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE
The Wollaston/East neighborhood of Quincy is bounded by Quincy Shore Drive (east), Furnace Brook Parkway (south), the META tracks (west), and Hayward Street-Hancock Street-Albion Road Vassall Street (north). An outstanding feature of this area is the Josiah Quincy House (1770), mansion house of the Quincy estate which derived from the original 1635 several thousand acre grant to Edmund Quincy of some of the best farmland in New England. A sizeable portion of the estate was not subdivided for the development of late 19th and 20th century housing until the last Quincy sister died in 1893. Other important features in this area are the 83-acre Merrymount Park (1885); historic Blacks Creek, the site of Edmund Quincy's tidal grist mill; and the National Sailors Home Cemetery, the only evidence of the 80-acre National Sailors Home (1865, now demolished) of which 50 acres have become Conservation Commission land. The development process of Wollaston East was greatly accelerated by the Old Colony Railroad which began operations in 1845 as well as by the advent of Quincy's extensive street railway system.

Number 139-141 Clay Street is one of three similarly designed double residences in a row on Clay Street. They are built on land that formerly belonged to John Faxon, who sold much of his property to the Wollaston Land Associates for the development of Wo1laston Hill. Faxon was also the uncle of Henry Munroe Faxon, the son of Henry Hardwick Faxon, the fabulously successful real estate entrepreneur. Number 139-141 Clay Street was acquired by the Edward A. King, a bookkeeper in 1897 and stayed in the King family until after 1930.

BIBLIOGRAPHY and/or REFERENCES
Assessors Records.
H. Hobart Holly, ed. Quincy: 350 Years, 1974.
Robert A. McCaughey. Josiah Quincy, 1772-1864:The Last Federalist. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1974.
William S. Pattee. A History of Old Braintree and Quincy, 1878, p. 310.

ARCHITECTURAL SIGNIFICANCE:
Responding to the need of housing, Quincy built many double residences, apartment buildings and three-deckers. This house is one of the early double residences built in the 1860s in a traditional style, with steep Gothic Revival gables dominating the facade. A simple hip roof balustraded porch, supported by square posts, unites the two entrances. The house is set on a typical Quincy granite foundation, has clapboarded walls and regular fenestration. It is an attractive and picturesque component of Clay Street, particularly when seen with the two others (see photograph of 149 Clay Street) which are similar and create a fine enclave of mid 19th century Quincy double residences.

Back