Reverend Wakefield Gale, a Congregational clergyman in Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts, was born in 1797. He was the eldest son of Joseph Gale (1768-1851) and Susannah Frye of Pembroke, New Hampshire. Joseph and Susannah had five other children: Sally (b. 1795); Susan (b. 1799, married Calvin Ransom); Lucinda (b. 1803, married Solomon Kitteridge); John Adams (b. 1807); and Joseph Worcester, Jr. (b. 1809).

Wakefield was educated at Phillips Andover Academy in Andover, Massachusetts from 1816 to 1818. He went on to study at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire from 1818 to 1822 and ultimately completed his studies at Andover Theological Seminary in 1825.

In 1826 Wakefield began a missionary position in Eastport, Maine by appointment of the Board of Trustees of the Massachusetts Missionary Society. He later preached for short periods in North Yarmouth, Maine, Gloucester, Massachusetts, and Boston. Beginning in 1841, Wakefield maintained a more permanent position in Rockport, Massachusetts.

On September 18, 1828 Wakefield married Mary Louisa Bigelow (1806-1861), daughter of Asa Sgt. and Lydia Bigelow of Colchester, Connecticut. Mary Louisa had four sisters, Mary Eliza, Mrs. Ann Eliza Safford, Mrs. Abby Jane Safford, Mrs. Ann Elizabeth Turner, and one brother, A.J. Bigelow.

Wakefield and Mary Louisa had eleven children: William Wakefield (b. 1832); William Turner (b. 1833); Ann Eliza Safford (b. 1835, married Lyman Williston); William Turner (b. 1837); Joseph Wakefield (b. 1839, married Hattie Jewell); Edward (b. 1841); Justin Edwards (b. 1844); Jeremiah Evarts, twin of Justin; Mary Louisa (b. 1846); John Newton (b. 1848); and Newton Bigelow (b. 1850).

Mary Louisa Gale died April 12, 1861, and Wakefield passed away in 1881.