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Peter Busby Waite, OC FRSC is a Canadian historian, and a retired Dalhousie University professor.
Born in Toronto, Ontario, he attended high school in Saint John, New Brunswick. He obtained B.A. and M.A. degrees from the University of British Columbia, and a PhD degree from the University of Toronto. He served with the Royal Canadian Navy during World War II, attaining the rank of Lieutenant.
Popularly known as P.B. Waite, Dr. Waite began his association in 1951 with Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He taught at Dalhousie first as a lecturer in history, then assistant professor and finally Thomas McCulloch Professor of History from 1960 until his retirement. He is currently a professor emeritus and lives in Halifax.
Waite is an elegant writer, known especially for his analysis of the events leading to Confederation and the subsequent 30 years from 1867 to 1896. His Arduous Destiny, a history of Canada from 1874 to 1896, was part of The Canadian Centenary Series, a multi-volume project which was commissioned for the centenary of Canadian Confederation in 1967.
He has published biographies of three Conservative Canadian Prime Ministers. His 1985 biography of Sir John Sparrow David Thompson, some ten years in the making, remains a thorough and fundamental resource on Thompson.
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