East Abington Painters — Abington's east edge

In the 1800s, East Abington was a village of Abington with its own shoe manufacturers; by 1865 its manufacturers turned out $3.5 million worth of shoes and boots, according to the Rockland Historic Commission. A fight over school spending pushed it to leave. Residents petitioned the state on January 21, 1874, and the town of Rockland was incorporated that March 10. The Third Church of East Abington belongs to Rockland's history today.

This page uses the name for the streets of present-day Abington that run up to the Rockland line, not for the old village, which is now its own town.

Census Block Groups 1 and 2 of Tract 5201 form that eastern edge. The Census geocoder puts parts of Plymouth Street, Central Street, Charles Street, Park Avenue, Walnut Street and Washington Street from about number 500 to 1100 inside them. Together they hold 1,214 housing units, and about 46% were built in 1939 or earlier, a much larger share than the 21.1% for Abington as a whole. Close to 77% predate 1980. Owners occupy roughly 88% of the homes, and about two-thirds of units are single-family detached. These are block-group estimates with wide margins, so treat them as approximate.

Nearly half the houses are pre-1940

A house built before 1940 can carry the paint of many repaint cycles. On the exterior, the question is whether the existing layers are still bonded. Peeling down to bare wood, or cracking in a grid pattern, means scraping alone won't be enough on those areas. Read more on exterior painting in Abington.

Lead-safe prep on older paint

With roughly three in four homes here built before 1980, the starting assumption on any paid job that disturbs old paint is that it may contain lead. EPA's RRP rule for pre-1978 housing requires certified firms and set work practices. Our lead-safe painting page explains what that looks like on site.

Detached houses in Block Group 2

In Block Group 2, about 88% of units are single-family detached and more than 9 in 10 were built before 1980. A detached house has no shared wall or porch, so color, timing and scope are settled for that one building without a neighbor's sign-off.

Some attached and two-family housing

Block Group 1 also counts about 135 single-family attached units and 112 in two-unit buildings, though both estimates carry margins about as large as the counts themselves. Where a wall or porch is shared, both owners need to agree on color and timing. See condo painting in Abington.