Quincy, Mass. Historical and Architectural Survey

11 Bass Street

HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE
The Wollaston/East neighborhood of Quincy is bounded by Quincy Shore Drive (east), Furnace Brook Parkway (south), the MBTA 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 sizable 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 development process of Wollaston East was greatly accelerated by the Old Colony Railroad which began operations in 1845.

The meticulously maintained consciously preserved residence at 11 Bass Street was erected by the well-known local builder, Edward H. Sears. Active in the Wollaston area, Sears had later commissions to build the Wollaston Theatre (1926) and the Wollaston Park Apartments (1927). There is an interesting puzzle concerning the history of the house. The present owner feels the house was built in 1890 for an Emanuel Johnson and he sold to her father. Stephen Boyajian, a shoemaker, about 1935. Helen A. Boyajian purchased the house from her father about 1974. Working with atlases, this researcher has problems finding the house is older than 1908. It would be interesting to work with the owner to solve this riddle.

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.
Hellen G.-Boyajian. owner of 11 Bass Street.
William S. Pattee. A History of Old Braintree and Quincy, 1878. p. 310.
D. Foster Taylor. "Wollaston As It Was. in the 1870's" Quincy History. Quincy Historical
Society, no. 11. January 1985, p. 5.

ARCHITECTURAL SIGNIFICANCE:
The Shingle Style which followed the exuberant Queen Anne Style war, favored for sea side and suburban homes. The trend began with the grandiose shingled summer homes of McKim, Mead and White in the 1880s and continued with the fine Shingle Style houses of William Ralph Emerson in Massachusetts and John Calvin Stevens in Maine. They were characterized by quiet compact massing, enveloping roofs which were often gambreled, simple classic details and the use of weathered shingles to "wrap" the house. It was considered an American derived architecture which was influenced by the early weathered clapboarded and shingled 17th century houses then being studied with great avidity. The continued interest in the architectural past of the East coast led soon after to the Colonial Revival Style.

This fine Shingle Style residence is set on a typical Quincy granite foundation and has a characteritic cross gambrel roof enveloping the house creating a compact massing. The classically derived balustraded porch with columns supporting the roof indicates that it looks forward to the Colonial Revival Style The fenestration is regular, consisting of one over one sash windows. It is an attractive component of the Bass Street streetscape

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