Waltham (/ˈwɔːlθæm/ WAWL-tham) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, and was an early center for the labor movement as well as a major contributor to the American Industrial Revolution.

[3] Waltham borders Watertown and Belmont to the east, Lexington to the north, Lincoln and Weston to the west, and Newton to the south.

At the time of European arrival, Waltham was in a border zone between the territories of the Pawtucket confederation and the Massachusett, with nearby native settlements at Nonantum and Pequosset (Watertown).

[6] A native trail through Waltham, the "Old Connecticut Path" saw continued use after colonization and became the basis for present day Route 20.

[7] The name derives from the Anglo-Saxon words, weald or wald "forest" and ham "homestead" or "enclosure."

[8] In the early 19th century, Francis Cabot Lowell and his friends and colleagues established in Waltham the Boston Manufacturing Company—the first integrated textile mill in the United States, with the goal of eliminating the problems of co-ordination, quality control, and shipping inherent in the subcontracting based textile industry.

In the late 19th and early 20th century, Waltham was home to the brass era automobile manufacturer Metz, where the first production motorcycle in the U.S. was built.

Another first in Waltham industrial history involves the method to mass-produce the magnetron tube, invented by Percy Spencer at Raytheon.

Waltham was also the home of the Walter E. Fernald State School, the western hemisphere's oldest publicly funded institution serving people with developmental disabilities.

[10][11] The storied and controversial history of the institution has long been covered by local and, at times, national media.

The Common is on Main Street, which is home to several churches, the Waltham Public Library, and Post Office.

Waltham has several neighborhoods or villages, including:[50] It is bordered to the west by Weston and Lincoln, to the south by Newton, to the east by Belmont and Watertown, and to the north by Lexington.

Moody Street in downtown Waltham offers its own brand of entertainment with a colorful assortment of shops, restaurants, and bars.

Moody Street's booming nightlife, convenience to the commuter rail and lower rents have attracted younger professionals to Waltham in growing numbers in recent years.

[67][68][69] The city of Waltham has a free "Tick Tock Trolley" on Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings from 6pm–11pm for visitors that provides easy access to local municipal parking lots.

[70] Starting in 2020, the City of Waltham in Massachusetts has shut down a large portion of the main road, Moody St., to vehicular traffic from May 1 until October 31 annually.

Moody Street is lined with restaurants and other small businesses but typically has high volumes of automobile passage.

Bus stops that would typically be on the blocked off part of Moody St. are temporarily relocated to nearby spots.

The Waltham Philharmonic Orchestra, a civic symphony of the MetroWest area, began in 1985 under the direction of local musicians David J. Tierney and Harold W. McSwain, Jr. With almost 60 professional, semi-professional, and amateur musicians, the orchestra's mission is to provide the Waltham community with the opportunity to perform in and attend classical concerts of the highest quality.

There are five to six concerts throughout the season, including one that features the winner of the annual Youth Concerto Competition, which provides opportunities for young musicians to perform solo works with the WPO.

The annual Latinos en Acción Festival celebrates the many Puerto Rican, Mexican, Peruvian, and Guatemalan residents.

[78] Among the companies based in Waltham are medtech corporation PerkinElmer, biopharmaceutical services provider Paraxel, energy supply company Global Partners, data services provider Lionbridge, Steel Connect, broker-dealer Commonwealth Financial Network, technology companies Care.com and StudentUniverse, research and development organization Education Development Center (EDC), provisioner of scientific instrumentation Thermo Fisher Scientific, and the marketing firm Constant Contact.

Footwear manufacturer Wolverine World Wide, Inc. moved their regional headquarters from Lexington to the CityPoint campus in July 2016.

[84] Waltham High School's sports teams had been referred to as the Watchmen and the Crimson, before they changed the name to the Hawks.

Due to its proximity to the center of the Greater Boston metropolitan area, a number of state highways are within a few miles.

WCAC-TV is the cable access and provides opportunities for community members to learn how to create their own local-interest television programming.

Waltham was formerly the home of classical radio station WCRB (99.5 FM), which relocated to the WGBH studios in Brighton in 2006.