James Ezekiel Emerson was born in Norridgewock, Maine, where his greatgrandfather had originally settled as a Congregational minister. The fourth child of Ezekiel and Amanda (Leeman) Emerson, he was sixth in descent from Joseph and Elizabeth (Bulkeley) Emerson, and seventh from Thomas Emerson who settled at Ipswich, Massachusetts, about 1636.
When he was three years old his parents moved to a farm at Bangor, Maine, and here he received such education as the schools afforded and assisted in the farm labors as soon as his strength permitted.
Then for six years he worked as a journeyman at his trade in many towns in Maine, finally settling with his family in Lewiston in 1850.
He moved there primarily to build houses for the Lewiston Falls Water Power Company and constructed in the course of two years the first three blocks of houses in Lewiston Falls.
During this time, too, he invented an automatic machine to bore, turn, and cut the heads on wood spools and bobbins and organized a manufactory to make this machine.
Shortly thereafter, however, he emigrated to California where he engaged in building and lumbering enterprises around Oroville and Sacramento.
It was while thus engaged that he turned his attention to the improvement of power-driven circular saws and invented the removable-tooth saw.
Disposing of all of his interests in California in 1859, he returned to the East, settled in Trenton, N. J. , and there organized a company to manufacture edge tools.
During the Civil War large quantities of cavalry sabres, officer’s swords and bayonets were made by his company for the federal government.
Six years later the firm name was changed to Emerson, Smith & Company.
Emerson continued the direction of this organization until about 1890, when he retired from active business.
He invented an automatic machine to bore, turn, and cut the heads on wood spools and bobbins and organized a manufactory to make this machine. He turned his attention to the improvement of power-driven circular saws and invented the removable-tooth saw. His most enduring work, however, was accomplished through his teaching, two of his students being Zilpah Grant, who later founded Ipswich Academy, and Mary Lyon, the founder of Mount Holyoke Seminary, afterward to become the college of that name.
He was one of the original members of the American Institute of Instruction, founded in 1830.
