Boston taught himself to read and write using the Bible. He was the author of 3 books, and he taught Sunday School for 34 years.

He accumulated and rented 36 homes in Greenville, mostly on Reade St. where he lived in a two-story house. All 36 homes were painted green. Boyd won a case in the US Supreme Court against the white American officials of Greenville who challenged his right to rent houses to white American people.

Two weeks before he died in Greenville in 1932 when he was 71, Boston bought 200 acres of cleared land and 75 acres of virgin timber. His daughter stated that he instructed her to allow people to live on the land rent-free during the Depression era.

His first book - The Seventh Wonder of the World; Discoveries of the Twentieth Century, Natural Science was published in 1903.
His second book was called Search-Light on the Bible with Natural Science; Discoveries of the Twentieth Century.
His third book and final book was called Searchlight on the Seventh Wonder; X-ray and Searchlight on the Bible with Natural Science, and Revised Searchlight on the Seventh Day Bible and X-Ray by Organic, Supernatural and Artificial Science; Discoveries of the Twentieth Century. In this last book he rebuked Christianity in this country and remarked that "no race can hope to survive [when] all of its grievances have to be settled by other races who are opposed to them as equals, on account of color."

He and his wife Mary Grimes Boyd who was b.15 Jul 1866 in Wilson, Wilson County, North Carolina, and she died 11 Oct 1946 (aged 80) in Greenville, Pitt County, North Carolina, had 11 children and lived in a two-story house at 113 Reade St. He worked as a sign painter, paper hanger and interior decorator. Boston and Mary were married in 1885.

Their children that are listed in Find A Grave
Ellen Bruce Boyd Hussey 1885–1968; Rich Plato Boyd 1895–1918; Francis Dewey Boyd 1898–1963; Alma E. Boyd Williams 1903–1978.

Sources: Find A Grave dotcom; Greenville historian Roger Kammerer via Digital lib ecu edu; Jane Welborn Hudson; Verona Joyner Langford North Carolina Collection, East Carolina University