James Edward Waite

James Edward Waite was a nineteenth-century blacksmith from East Stoughton (now Avon), whose tools are now on display at the Samuel Robbins 1820 Museum House in Avon, Massachusetts.
Born in 1843 in Bristol, England, he was one of 4 children of a laborer and scullery maid. As a young man of 7 he started learning the trade of blacksmithing. Alone at the age of 17 he took a ship to America, landing in Boston, MA. From there he went to Weymouth where he worked in a local blacksmith shopand met his wife. He finally moved to East Stoughton (now Avon, MA) where he opened a blacksmith shopnear the center. The shops in this small section of crossroads between Brockton and Boston MA thrived as it was the main travel route between all the towns and cities to the south and Boston. The shops located here consisted of two grocers, OB Crane and Lorenzo Wade, two blackmsithing concerns S.W. Haley and Waite and Son*. John Holmes proprietor of the stables and Barlett Collisn carriage shop. When his son was born the shop became "Waite and Son Iron Shop". Mr. Waite as well as other founding fathers of East Stoughton were instrumental in starting the fight to leave the Stoughton Centre township and form their own town of what is now Avon.