Jada Davis was born on a farm in West Texas farm, one of eleven children in a very poor family. As a child, he picked cotton to help support his family. From a young age he loved to read, and as a teenager he made some extra money by writing short pieces for magazines and newspapers. In the 1930s he attended a small college but left to enlist in the U.S. Army, where he trained with a horseback unit. When World War II began, Davis felt compelled to serve, but he was ill with tuberculosis, and spent the war years recovering in a sanitarium. After the war, he married and earned a degree from the University of Texas. He worked as an editor at several West Texas newspapers. Later, he and his wife ran a bookstore, while he wrote novels. In 1952, his most successful novel, One for Hell, was published. He gave up the bookstore and became a public relations executive for Southwestern Bell Telephone Company, where he stayed until his retirement.