author
Jonathan B. (Jonathan Billings) Davis
1790–1868
A 19th-century Massachusetts town officer rather than a literary celebrity, this author is remembered for helping preserve a remarkably detailed snapshot of local life in Acton. His surviving work offers a practical, ground-level view of property, community, and civic recordkeeping in 1850s New England.
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About the author
Jonathan B. Davis, also listed as Jonathan Billings Davis, is known today as one of the compilers of Valuation of Real Estate in the Town of Acton. November 2, 1850, a detailed record created with fellow Acton assessors Abraham Conant and Nathan Brooks. The work was published by vote of the inhabitants of Acton and documents the town’s real estate holdings and valuations, making it a useful window into everyday civic life in mid-19th-century Massachusetts.
Available records suggest he was born in Acton around 1789 or 1790 and died in 1868. Genealogical sources also identify him as a veteran of the War of 1812 and connect him to a long-established Acton family.
Although little personal biographical material appears to have survived in widely accessible sources, Davis’s contribution to Acton’s valuation record has lasting historical value. Rather than writing for fame, he helped create a practical document that now serves as a vivid resource for local historians, genealogists, and readers interested in early New England communities.