alt Hacker NewsFrom talking to people there, it seems like Quincy itself was less destroyed by politics and more just sort of left to rot by families with "important names" in the area who are resistant to change.
No idea which is accurate, that's just a consistent theme from almost every conversation when I was consulting there.
Common pattern in small-ish towns, where there is a core of older wealthy people who are stereotypical NIMBYs running everything, and who want to keep their quaint little town as it is. Problem is that forces all the young people to move away to find opportunity, and then 50 years later the town is dying.