227 Eagle Pkwy
St Paul, MN 55102, USA

John M Armstrong House

John M. Armstrong House, St. Paul, Minnesota, USA

Armstrong-Quinlan House

Built in 1886, the J. M. Armstrong House was located on the edge of downtown’s business district in a bustling residential and business neighborhood.

The community grew rapidly as Saint Paul’s population jumped from 41,473 in 1880 to 140,392 in 1895. New immigrants, often laborers or tradesmen, created a demand for affordable rental housing.

Recognizing a good opportunity, John Milton Armstrong hired Edward Payson Bassford, a noted local architect (he designed the second Minnesota State Capitol), to design a side-by-side duplex for use as income property on land inherited from his late brother George.

For almost 60 years, various tenants lived in the red brick house at 233-235 West Fifth Street. The Armstrong family owned the house until 1943, but did not live in it. In 1943, the Armstrong family sold to John and Dorothy Bloomquist.

Gordon and Helen Larson purchased the house in 1948 and converted it into Key Hospital for Recovering Alcoholics. The following year, Bertha Quinlan bought the house and turned it into the Quinlan Nursing Home. In the early 1950s the house was returned to the Larsons who continued to manage the nursing home. Laura and David Reynolds purchased the house in 1982, operating it as a board and care facility for seven years, until it was acquired by the State of Minnesota.

By the mid-1950s, commercial establishments overtook the neighborhood, and ultimately the distinctive house became the only residence in the area. In the late 1980s, the businesses near the house on Cleveland Circle moved and their buildings were demolished.

In 1983, local historic preservationists, alarmed about the fate of the house, succeeded in having The J. M. Armstrong House placed on The National Register of Historic Places. Soon after the house was designated a Saint Paul Heritage Preservation Site.

In 1987, the State of Minnesota bought the house as a potential site for the Minnesota Center For The Arts Education. When a different site was selected, it fell into disrepair, steadily deteriorated and was boarded up.

The City of Saint Paul bought the property in 2000, pledging to preserve and relocate the house. In early 2001, the City choose a site at Eagle Parkway and Shepard Road in the Irvine Park Historic District as the house’s new location.

Moving the Armstrong-Quinlan House, 2001 (Video)

Built in 1886, this red stone structure was the last remaining mansion in downtown St. Paul. Vacant for decades, it was moved several blocks away in November 2001 to make way for new development. At its new site, it was renovated into condominiums. This compilation of videos from the Capital City Show in the fall of 2001 tells the story. Produced by Mike Popadiuk and Mark Johnson.

National Register of Historic Places

Describe the present and original (if known) physical appearance:
The Armstrong House a 2 1/2 story brick double house, is located on the north side of West 5th Street, between Main Street and Smith Avenue, near Seven Corners in Downtown St. Paul. It is located in a commercial area, between the American Linen Company, a brick Victorian commercial building, and the Catholic Youth Center, a brick late Beaux Arts building.

The Armstrong House is 2 1/2 stories and U-shaped in plan, with the base of the "U" forming the facade. It measures sixty-four feet long, fifty feet wide, and forty-six feet tall and was constructed at an estimated cost of $21,000. The entire facade is profusely decorated with cut stone bands and molded brickwork in a variety of patterns. The asymmetrical four bay facade consists of alternately recessing and projecting bays topped with a multiple gabled roof adorned with numerous finials. The two double door entrances which flank the facade have somewhat altered wooden gabled- roof entrance porches. Between the two entrance porches are two bay windows, a three-sided one story bay window topped by a large segmental arch surrounding three windows on the east side, and a rectangular bay window with rounded corners which extends up two stories and is topped by a Palladian type attic window flanked by acorn finials in the gable end on the west side. On the second floor above the western entrance porch is a rounded arch into which is recessed a segmental arched window, while the eastern entrance porch is topped by a rectangular window enframed by projecting brick piers which extend up to a horizontal band with circular motifs which is topped by a pediment in the gable end with scrollwork in the tympanum.

The side and rear walls of the building are red pressed brick with little ornamentation other than limestone sills and lintels. The interior has been altered considerably. Sections of the wall which divides the double house have been removed and numerous fire doors have been installed. One of the original interior woodwork survives.

The exterior of the Armstrong House is basically intact although aluminum combination, windows have been installed and the original slate roof has been replaced with asphalt shingles. The entrance porches have been altered slightly and the brickwork within them has been painted. The building is in satisfactory condition though some of the brickwork is in need of repair.

The Armstrong House is located on a prime commercial site which is part of the City of St. Paul's Lower Cathedral Hill Development District. It is threatened with demolition due to development, proposed changes in street patterns, and the proposed extension of Interstate 35E.

State of Significance:
The Armstrong House, built in 1886, is historically and architecturally significant as one of the earliest and most sophisticated extant buildings designed by prominent St. Paul architect, Edward Payson Bassford (1838-1912) and as the only double house still standing in downtown St. Paul. It is a richly ornamented and picturesque 'design which incorporates Richardsonian Romanesque detailing applied to a Queen Anne form.

The land on which the Armstrong House was built was owned by Minnesota's first territorial treasurer, George Washington Armstrong, a real-estate speculator and lender who came to Minnesota in 1853, and died in 1877 leaving some twenty properties including the 233-235 West 5th Street site to his family who lived on Summit Avenue in a house which was demolished in 1887 to make way for the construction of the James J. Hill House. John Milton Armstrong, the brother of George Washington Armstrong, was appointed trustee to the properties, and it was he who commissioned Bassford to design the double house in 1886 as a rental property. The Armstrong family owned the house until 1943. In 1948 the building was purchased by the present owners who converted it to the Key Hospital for alcoholics, and seventeen years later established the Armstrong House, a board and care facility which was named after Bertha Quinlan, a partial owner of the property from 1950-52.

Bassford, the architect of the Armstrong House, was born in Maine, studied architecture under Charles Painter, and Peabody and Stearns in Boston. He came to St. Paul in 1866 where he became one of the city's leading Victorian architects. His designs include the first combined City Hall and Court House (built in 1884- 1886) and the Germaina Life Building (1888), the Walsh Building (1888), and the McColl Building (1892), a St. Paul Heritage Preservation Commission and National Register of Historic Places site. Bassford also designed a number of houses, dating from 1890 to 1910, many of which are still standing in the Historic Hill District of St. Paul and most of which are Colonial Revival in style.

Double house, 233-235 West Fifth Street, St. Paul

Quinlan Nursing Home.
Content: 03/19/1949

Photographer: St. Paul Dispatch-Pioneer Press

Architecture Place

Color photograph of Armstrong-Quinlan House at 15 West Kellogg Boulevard in downtown Saint Paul.