Market Street District

Three buildings—the YMCA (NR), the Grand Army of the Republic (GAR) Hall (NR), and the Goddard Brothers Store—project a turn-of-the-century vibrancy. Henry J. Preston of Boston won the competition in 1880 to design the YMCA Building (64–68 Market Street), a multiple-use structure acquired by the Masons in 1922. The exterior is a late example of High Victorian Gothic with broad ogee arches and stone trim against brick walls. Cast-iron cresting linking the multiple chimneys above the cornice line contributes to the unusual architectural integrity of this block. Five years later the Grand Army of the Republic erected a brick building (58 Andrew Street) nearby for their clubhouse. Frank Kelly, the designer-contractor for the building, used Richardsonian Romanesque forms with dark quarry-faced sandstone trim that includes foliated capitals for the pilasters. Inside, the GAR Hall retains original stenciling and furnishings and holds an extensive collection of Civil War books and artifacts. The city acquired the building and maintains it as a museum.

Between these two nineteenth-century landmarks stands an outstanding example of an early-twentieth-century department store. The Goddard Brothers Store (76–92 Market Street) features a facade composed almost entirely of leaded glass display windows in the upper two stories framed in a facade constructed of cast iron and pressed metal. Wheeler and Betton, a Lynn architectural firm, designed the store in 1909 for Franklin and Wallace Goddard of Boston. Charles Bet-ton added the eastern three bays (now a separate property) in 1921. The 1940s “Zimman's” graphics across the facade add a Moderne touch of visual delight.