Robert S. Abbott House

Style: Queen Anne
City: Chicago, IL

Built around 1900 as the left half of an asymmetrical duplex on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, this house was the home of Robert S. Abbott, founder and publisher of the Chicago Defender — the most-circulated African-American newspaper in the country — from 1926 until his death in 1940. It stands at the south end of a row of houses on the same block as the Harold Washington Cultural Center, and was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1976.

the building

Shared roofline. Abbott's half of the duplex sits under a shared hip roof, with a large gabled section projecting two bays wide on his side. His entrance is sheltered under its own side porch, while the neighboring unit's entrance sits in a single bay beside it.

the style

The house combines Late Victorian and Neo-Classical elements typical of Chicago's turn-of-the-century row houses; its exact construction date is unknown but estimated at 1900 from its detailing.

significance

Designated a National Historic Landmark in 1976 for Abbott's role building the Chicago Defender into the nation's most-circulated Black newspaper.

nearby

Mt. Pisgah Missionary Baptist Church Complex 400 ft · Neoclassical · 1912
Oscar Stanton De Priest House 0.2 mi · 1920
Ebenezer Missionary Baptist Church Building 0.2 mi · Neoclassical · 1898
Anthony Overton Elementary School 0.4 mi · Mid-Century Modern · 1963
Belmonte Flats 0.5 mi · Richardsonian Romanesque · 1893
First Church of Deliverance 0.6 mi · 1939

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