Byron Waite was first elected justice of the peace in 1853 and re-elected in 1866. He farmed at the south end of town, wrote a History of the town of Canadice, published in 1876 and - like many others - fell in love with the lakes of Canadice.
Here is his description, published in the Ontario County Times on Wednesday, August 2, 1876, of the eastern shore of Hemlock Lake in the town of Canadice.
"A man by the name of Farewell, loving the beautiful, the romantic and the sequested shores of the hemlock Lake, built a fisherman's cabin on what is now called "half-Way Point" in the year 1825.
"Here he spent his odd hours and days until 1827 when Abner Goodrich erected a house and commenced keeping tavern. this was when the 1st road was worked along the eastern shore of the lake. since the days of Goodrich, Joseph King, Phillip Wetmore, Daniel Peabody, John King, Knowles & Wemett, E. J. Copeland, and Henry J. Wemett, the present owner, have lived, loved, fished and hunted at this quiet & pleasant place of resort.
"About the time farewell camped on its shore, a lonely benedict but still a man like him, of a taste for the beautiful, built another cabin on a point about a mile and a half from the head of the lake, which is still called "Curtis Point." He was a camper here for a while, and was afterwards found dead on the western shore of the lake.
"Within the past year, summer cottages have been put up and others are being erected near the head of the lake, where many a pleasure seeker finds a respite from the busy cares of life, and having arrived at the end of this part of our history, with the many mistakes of ourself and the printer, and many thanks to those who have kindly assisted us in our mazy wanderings, we will now leave the reader at the writer's cabin on the shores of the Hemlock for a doze, a fish, a lunch or a pleasure excursion on the frisky little steamer "Seth Green," now heaving in sight, skipping the waters 'like a thing of life.'"