Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography/Bright, Jonathan Broun

BRIGHT, Jonathan Brown, author, b. in Waltham, Mass., 23 April, 1800; d. there, 17 Dec., 1879. He was educated in the Waltham common schools and in Westford (Mass.) academy, and at sixteen years of age removed to Missouri. Five years later he engaged in business in Alabama, and in 1823 went to New York, where he became a cotton-broker. In 1849 he left business and retired to his native place, where he was known as a public-spirited citizen. Mr. Bright became interested in genealogy, and made many researches into his family history both here and in England, the results of which were published in a volume intended for private distribution, which has been pronounced a model for works of its kind. It is entitled “The Brights of Suffolk, England, represented in America by the Descendants of Henry Bright, Jr., who settled at Watertown, Mass., about 1630” (1858). Mr. Bright left to Harvard college $50,000, the income to be divided between the purchase of books and the support of scholarships, to which Brights lineally descended from Henry Bright, Jr., should have priority of claim.