Thomas Emerson's Sons, manufacturers of gentleman's dress shoes, was located at the corner of Main Street and Yale Avenue. Born in 1785, founder Thomas Emerson was said to be "obliged from very early years to work at the bench" and is reported to have started his shoemaking in earnest in 1805. According to Lilley Eaton's Genealogical History of the Town of Reading, he formed a partnership with Ebenezer Nelson in 1810 for the manufacture of shoes, which "continued with a fair measure of success" until Nelson felt the calling to become a preacher and the business was amicably dissolved. Emerson was joined by his sons, Thomas, Jr. as a partner in 1837, and James Emerson in 1851 when the company became Thomas Emerson & Sons. The name was changed to Thomas Emerson's Sons, with the retirement of the founder in 1854. Originally located near Lawrence Street, the company moved to Albion Street and then to Yale Avenue/Main Street in 1863, the site formerly occupied by Burrage Yale's tin factory. The addition of the labor-saving McKay sewer required the expansion of the business and the enlargement of the factory. The Thomas Emerson's Sons factory closed in 1902, and the building was razed to make way for the YMCA. In Eaton's book, published in 1874, three years after Emerson's death, he was credited with inaugurating a system of cash payments to "workmen" in place of the customary barter system. "By the frequent introduction of improved machinery and methods, he was able to furnish profitable occupation to large numbers of people." Image from the Wakefield Municipal Gas and Light Department annual calendar, 2021 Photo courtesy of the Wakefield Daily Item.
