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COOLING SPRINGS FARM

On the Underground Railroad

Near Adamstown, Maryland

    To map of 61 Underground Railroad sites near Cooling Springs Farm

Learn more about the Underground Railroad  . . .

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> International news on the Underground Railroad of today

Visit Underground Railroad Free Press for up-to-date Underground Railroad news, links, international calendar and more

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> Visit the most comprehensive map of  Underground Railroad Sites

Link to Googleπs MapMuse map of over 300 Underground Railroad sites across the United States and Canada

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> To book on Cooling Springs Farm
and the local Underground Railroad

Link to the web site of An American Family of the Underground Railroad, the story of Cooling Springs Farm

COOLING SPRINGS FARM

Tours

Tours of Cooling Springs Farm and its Underground Railroad safe-house are arranged by appointment or through the organizations listed under the programs section of this website.  To arrange a tour directly, contact Cooling Springs Farm.

Driving Directions

If you are arriving by airplane or train, see directions following the driving directions

From Washington, DC, and East

Take Interstate 270 north to Frederick, then very briefly onto Interstate 70 west, then US15 south. You will now be on US15 and US340 combined.  Where they diverge, take US15 to your left.  After about two miles, turn left onto Mountville Road, then right on Ballenger Creek Pike to Cooling Springs Farm at 2455 Ballenger Creek Pike.

From Baltimore and East

Take Interstate 70 west to Frederick, then US15 south. You will now be on US15 and US340 combined.  Where they diverge, take US15 to your left.  After about two miles, turn left onto Mountville Road, then right on Ballenger Creek Pike to Cooling Springs Farm at 2455 Ballenger Creek Pike.

From Pennsylvania and North

Take US15 south through Frederick, Maryland. After passing through Frederick, you will be on US15 and US340 combined.  Where they diverge, take US15 to your left.  After about two miles, turn left onto Mountville Road, then right on Ballenger Creek Pike to Cooling Springs Farm at 2455 Ballenger Creek Pike.

From Virginia and South

Find your way to US Route 15 north which lies to the west of Interstate 95 and to the east of Interstate 81.  Take US15 north across the Potomac River.  Immediately after crossing the river, turn right onto Maryland Route 28, and then take an immediate left onto Ballenger Creek Pike to Cooling Springs Farm at 2455 Ballenger Creek Pike.

From West Virginia and  West

Take US340 north across the Potomac River. Where US340 meets US15, follow the signs to US15 south which involves a U-turn at Mount Zion Road.  You are now going south of US340 and US15 combined. Where they diverge, take US15 to your left.  After about two miles, turn left onto Mountville Road, then right on Ballenger Creek Pike to Cooling Springs Farm at 2455 Ballenger Creek Pike.

Or, take Interstate 70 from the west to US15 south at Frederick. At first, you will be on US15 and US340 combined.  Where they diverge, take US15 to your left.  After about two miles, turn left onto Mountville Road, then right on Ballenger Creek Pike to Cooling Springs Farm at 2455 Ballenger Creek Pike.

Arriving by Air

The easiest of the three major local airports for travelers arriving by air is Thurgood Marshall International Airport (BWI) in Baltimore.  Other choices are National Airport (DCA) in Washington DC or Dulles International Airport (IAD) near Washington, DC.  For driving directions from Marshall Airport, see under Baltimore above.  From Dulles Airport, take Virginia Route 267 west to US15 north and follow the directions above for ≥From Virginia and the South.≤  Dulles Airport is about 15 minutes closer to Cooling Springs Farm but flights into Baltimore are usually less expensive than to Dulles.  Departures are also much easier at Marshall than from Dulles.

Arriving by Train

There is commuter train service several times daily from Union Station in Washington DC to Point of Rocks which is three miles from Cooling Springs Farm.  If you do not have transportation after reaching Point of Rocks, you may call for a taxi at Bowie Transportation at 301.695.0333.

COOLING SPRINGS FARM

The History of Cooling Springs Farm and the
Michael Family in the Underground Railroad

Cooling Springs Farm, located three miles north of the Potomac River in Frederick County, Maryland, is one of only a small handful of Underground Railroad safe-houses still known today in border or southern states of the United States. The familyπs passed-down oral tradition is that freedom seekers escaping slavery found shelter by the Michael family at the farm's spring house, the actual safe-house of the Underground Railroad and that Cooling Springs Farm was operated by the Michael family as a safe-house and route on the Underground Railroad from at least 1855 and possibly earlier. 

Cooling Springs Farm was founded by Andrew Michael, a Swiss immigrant, and his wife Barbara on July 12, 1768.  Andrew was the son of the Swiss explorer Franz Ludwig Michel who was one of the first European explorers of Frederick County in the years 1701 to 1705, and who founded New Bern, North Carolina in 1709.  Andrew was one of four brothers who immigrated to Frederick County and Washington County, Maryland, in the mid-1700s.  Today, Cooling Springs Farm is owned by Peter and Vicki Michael who are the seventh generation of the Michael family at Cooling Springs, a record of longevity of ownership by one family not matched by many other properties in the United States.  After purchasing Cooling Springs in 2001, Peter and Vicki Michael began restoration of the farm, home and spring house, and have made Cooling Springs Farm available to the general public and to the various institutions and programs listed on this web site.  Since occupying Cooling Springs Farm in 2004, the couple has hosted over 1,300 visitors to the site.

According to the story passed down in the family, the roots of involvement by Cooling Springs Farm in the Underground Railroad began in the mid-1800s with Andrew and Barbara Michael's grandchildren Ezra and Henry Michael, brothers who owned contiguous farms between Point of Rocks and Doubs, Maryland.  Peter Michael is the great-great-grandson of Ezra Michael.  The two brothers and their Michael in-laws, the Thomas and Virts families who owned farms abutting the Michael farms, along with several local churches and the adjoining black-founded villages of Doubs, Pleasant View, Hall Town and Adamstown, formed a corps of abolitionist sentiment in southern Frederick County. The area controlled by these families, churches and villages beginning at the Potomac River, the border between Union states and the Confederacy, and extending northward three miles to Doubs, Maryland, comprises the Potomac-to-Doubs Route of the Underground Railroad.  The entire route was designated by Scenic America in 2006 as a national scenic place deserving protection.

During the time it was operated as a safe-house on the Underground Railroad, Cooling Springs Farm was owned by Ezra and Margaret Michael who in 1842, the year after they were married, helped to found the nearby St. Paul's Episcopal Church, established then and continuing to operate today as an integrated parish.  Margaret Michael came from the abolitionist Dudderar family of Urbana, Frederick County, Maryland, and it appears to have been Margaret who was the instigator of Michael family involvement in abolitionism and the Underground Railroad.  Ezra Michael was a judge who, the family likes to say, upheld and interpreted the law of man by day and followed a higher law by night in aiding freedom seekers.

Cooling Springs Farm lies within the Carrollton Manor Land Trust, the Catoctin Mountain Scenic Byway, the Journey Through Hallowed Ground and the Civil War Heritage Area.  The farm is listed on the Maryland Inventory of Historic Places and several Underground Railroad site lists, and is a Frederick County Landmark.  In 2006, the family donated a permanent conservation easement to the Maryland Environmental Trust putting the farm into perpetual protection against future development.

Margaret and Ezra established a Michael tradition of promotion of good race relations which took the form in later generations of direct personal involvement in integrating the Methodist Church by Walter M. Michael I and his son Marion S. Michael II, and the United States Air Force by Pierce B. Michael, Sr., the son of Walter and father of present Cooling Springs owner Peter H. Michael.  Margaret and Ezra were not the last Michaels to usher a slave to freedom: this distinction came in 1941 to their great-grandson, Harvey N. Michael III, who as a young United States Army soldier stationed in The Philippines, bought the freedom of an enslaved 16-year-old Chinese.  In 1942, Harvey was captured by the Japanese and enslaved himself in a coal mine near Nagasaki, Japan, for the remainder of the war.  Thus the freer of a slave had become a slave.   There is much more to the familyπs integration struggles and the amazing story of Harvey Michael which is provided fully in the book authored by Peter Michael, An American Family of the Underground Railroad.

Today, the most distinguished family practitioner of the Michael legacy of fostering good race relations is Walter M. Michael II, member of the faculty of music and Artist in Residence at McDaniel College in nearby Westminster, Maryland, who in 1994 founded Common Ground, a McDaniel program which advances racial harmony through traditional music. 

COOLING SPRINGS FARM

Photos of the Potomac-to-Doubs Route of the Underground Railroad, Cooling Springs Farm and Nearby Underground Railroad Landmarks

One stretch of the Potomac-to-Doubs Route of the Underground Railroad running three miles from the Potomac River up through Cooling Springs Farm to Doubs, Maryland.  This photograph is of Thomas's Lane just north of the Potomac River.  This is what freedom seekers saw in their first few minutes in Union territory.  Thomas's Lane has existed since the early 1800s when the farm through which it runs was purchased by the Thomas family, in-laws and neighbors of the Michaels.

Further north on the Potomac-to-Doubs Route of the Underground Railroad, here overlooking Cooling Springs Farm and the Michael homestead in the background.  The three–mile route of the Potomac-to-Doubs Route of the Underground Railroad consists of a network of old farm roads and lies intact in the same place as in Underground Railroad days.  It is a rarity today that this length of an old Underground Railroad route remains whole and undisturbed by development,

What freedom seekers saw: the Spring House Station, hidden beyond the bridge past the creeks of Cooling Springs Farm. Frank and Emily Wanzer, Barnaby and Mary Elizabeth Grigby, and two unknown others passed through Cooling Springs Farm on Christmas Eve, 1855, and might have been sheltered in the Spring House by Ezra and Margaret Michael and their family after the six had escaped that morning from Oak Hill Plantation near Leesburg, Virginia, 15 miles south of Cooling Springs where they had been enslaved.  The next day, Christmas, while the party of six was traveling north from Cooling Springs to Pennsylvania, one of the unknown freedom seekers was shot and killed by slave catchers, the other captured and re-enslaved.  The Wanzers and Grigbys escaped at gun point, went on north, and lived the rest of their lives in Canada.  Cooling Springs Farm has located the descendants of Frank Wanzer and they and the Michael family have shared their common history.

On the left is Allen Nelson, great-great-grandson of freedom seeker Frank Wanzer who passed through Cooling Springs Farm in 1855, and on the right, Peter Michael, great-great-grandson of Ezra and Margaret Michael who operated Cooling Springs Farm as an Underground Railroad safe-house at the time.  Between them is Januwa Moja, wife of Mr. Nelson, and behind the three is the Spring House where Frank Wanzer and his five fellow freedom seekers were likely sheltered.  The spring house is shown here before restoration.

The first public tour of  Cooling Springs Farm and spring house conducted in August, 2002.  Shown here are several members of the Michael family and of the Ambush and Harris families, long-time neighbors of the old African-American village of Pleasant View adjoining the Michael farms.  The three families have known each other for at least six generations.  The spring house is shown in the background before restoration.

Rhonda and Sparky Rucker, left above, lead celebrants in Underground Railroad songs at the rededication of Cooling Springs Farm on July 2, 2003.  The Ruckers are the national leaders in rediscovering and keeping the songs of the Underground Railroad before the audiences of today.  On the right is Walt Michael.

On the right in this circa 1900 photograph is the home of Ezra and Margaret Michael from which they directed local Underground Railroad operations.  This original Cooling Springs home, begun in 1768 by the first generation of the family, lasted until about 1927.  The "new" Cooling Springs home, still so called, built by Ezra and Margaret in 1879, is in the top center of the photograph, and is the farm residence today.

The present Cooling Springs home built by Ezra and Margaret Michael in 1879. This home is typical of the local vernacular farmhouse architecture of the mid- to late nineteenth century, and retains its original layout, floors, walls, ceilings, three chimneys, stone masonry and most fixtures.  Cooling Springs Farm is a Frederick County Landmark, the home is listed by the Maryland Historical Trust in the Maryland Inventory of Historic Properties, and the farm and home are on national Underground Railroad registers and the Historic Home Tour of Frederick County.

St. Paul's Episcopal Church near Cooling Springs Farm.  The church was supported in its founding as an integrated parish by Ezra and Margaret Michael, their Thomas and Virts in-laws, and others in 1842, the year after Margaret and Ezra were married.  The church and its graveyard were integrated from the beginning and still are.  St. Paul's was active in the abolitionist movement and possibly in the Underground Railroad, and was used as a hospital by the Union Army during the Civil War.

Ezra (1813-1886) and Margaret (1823-1897) Michael.  She was born on his tenth birthday.

COOLING SPRINGS FARM

Peter Michael Available to Speak on the Underground Railroad

Cooling Springs owner Peter H. Michael is available to conventions, meetings and civic groups, and to television and radio to speak on the Underground Railroad and the involvement of one American family in it.  He has given many interviews and presentations in each of these media.  There is no charge.

Mr. Michael is the author of An American Family of the Underground Railroad on Michael family Underground Railroad involvement and the Underground Railroad in Frederick County, Maryland, where Cooling Springs Farm is located.  You may visit the book's web site or order the book here.

His latest book, Guide to Freedom: Rediscovering the Underground Railroad In One United States County, reveals the Underground Railroad in Frederick County, Maryland, where he lives, and nearby.  The book is available at Amazon and may be ordered wherever books are sold.

Peter Michael is also the author of Out of This World, an exposÈ of the failure of the United Nations to adequately assist poor countries in lowering their birth rates.  To purchase the book, click here.

Peter Michael is the founder and publisher of Underground Railroad Free Press, North Americaπs leading Underground Railroad news publication.  To subscribe to this free publication, order back issues, or submit articles, letters or advertising, visit the Underground Railroad Free Press web site here.

Mr. Michael is a co-founder and officer of Friends of the Underground Railroad, Inc., an international organization which seeks to identify and preserve remaining Underground Railroad sites, promote interest in the Underground Railroad, and advocate for education on the Underground Railroad. You are encouraged to visit the web site of Friends of the Underground Railroad here.

In his professional life, Peter Michael is founder and president of Michael Strategic Analysis, an award-winning firm located in Adamstown, Maryland, practicing strategic planning, market analysis and economic damages testimony.  Visit the MSA web site here.  Mr. Michael took his undergraduate degree at the University of Maryland, holds an MBA in international business from the University of California at Berkeley where his master's thesis became the cover story of a national magazine, and completed a post-graduate fellowship in demography at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.  He has taught management or demography at the graduate level at universities in Thailand, Japan, Costa Rica and the United States.

To schedule Mr. Michael for a presentation, click here.

COOLING SPRINGS FARM

Contact Cooling Springs Farm

2455 Ballenger Creek Pike
Adamstown Maryland 21710 USA

301 | 874 | 0235

E-mail Cooling Springs Farm here.

COOLING SPRINGS FARM

Research on the Underground Railroad and Cooling Springs Farm

The Underground Railroad is an especially difficult topic to research since it was an illegal and clandestine operation for all of its 280-year existence.  After the Civil War, some freedom seekers and a very few Underground Railroad conductors and safe-house operators wrote down their stories, but the vast majority did not.  Even after the Civil War and the enactment of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments, conductors and safe-house operators could be prosecuted for having broken the law as it was written when they aided freedom seekers, and therefore many of those who provided aid took their Underground Railroad involvement as secrets to the grave.

In other cases, families were split over the issue of slavery, and sibling did not dare tell sibling of involvement in the Underground Railroad.  This is true of the Michael family: Daniel and Samuel Michael, the two pro-slavery brothers of Ezra and Henry Michael, very likely did not know of their brothers' roles in sheltering freedom seekers, especially after Daniel and Samuel were removed from the will of their father for their pro-slavery stance.

Only about four percent of claimed Underground Railroad sites in the United States have documentary evidence of involvement with the other 96 percent known from oral tradition and occasional corroboration. The most likely source of information on the dwindling number of known Underground Railroad safe-houses and routes today is more than ever the oral traditions passed down in the families of freedom seekers, conductors and safe-house operators, and from property owner to property owner.  For example, the chance intersection of the present-day oral traditions of two families is how the Michael family, descendants of safe-house operators, became aware of the Wanzer family, the descendants of freedom seekers who were sheltered at Cooling Springs in 1855.  However, very few of these oral traditions have been published, and fewer still will show up in internet or bibliographic searches.  For the researcher interested in particular Underground Railroad sites or areas, the best approach, though it is time consuming, is to start asking the old families in the geographic area of interest, particularly African-American families.

Researching the Underground Railroad

For internet and bibliographic resources on the Underground Railroad in general, please click on this link.

Researching the Underground Railroad in Frederick County, Maryland

For internet, bibliographic and oral tradition resources on the Underground Railroad in Frederick County, Maryland, please click on this link.

Researching Cooling Springs Farm and the Michael family

For resources on the involvement of Cooling Springs Farm and the Michael family in the Underground Railroad, please click on this link, or contact us.

COOLING SPRINGS FARM

Sources on the Underground Railroad in General, the Underground Railroad in
Frederick County, Maryland, and the Michael Family

In the following bibliography, sources especially relevant to researching the Underground Railroad in and near Frederick County, Maryland, are identified with a bullet Ä.  Sources particularly relevant to researching the Michael family and its involvement in the Potomac-to-Doubs Route of the Underground Railroad are indicated by a double bullet ÄÄ.

1.      Ä Adamstown Regional Plan, Board of County Commissioners and  Division of Planning, Frederick County, Maryland, 2001

2.      ÄÄ Anonymous, A Brief History, St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Point of Rocks, Maryland, undated

3.      Anonymous, The Suppressed Book About Slavery, Carleton Publisher, New York, 1864

4.      ÄÄ Auel, John W., and Richard Thomas, records of auction of property of Marion S. Michael I, May 17, 1927 [unpublished record in possession of the applicants]

5.      Ä Barry, Sean, "County supports third Rural Legacy tract,"  The Frederick News-Post, Frederick, Maryland, October 31, 2002

6.      Blockson, Charles, "Escape from Slavery:  The Nation's Underground Railroad," National Geographic, July, 1984

7.      ÄÄ Bond, Isaac, Map of Frederick County, Maryland, E. Sachse & Co., Baltimore, 1858

8.      Ä Clarke, Nina Honemond, History of the Nineteenth-Century Black Churches in Maryland and Washington DC, Vantage Press, 1983, and as cited in her article in Frederick Magazine, February, 1991

9.      Ä Cohen, Anthony, The Underground Railroad:  A Personal Journey, Nova Audio Books, [undated]

10.   Constitution for the United States of America, Article I, Section 2, paragraph 3

11.   ÄÄ Curry, James [his narrative of slavery], reprinted in Slave Testimony: Two Centuries of Letters, Speeches, Interviews, and Autobiographies, John W. Blassingame, editor, Louisiana State University Press, 1977

12.   ÄÄ County of Frederick, County Courthouse, Frederick, Maryland [Wills]

13.   ÄÄ County of Frederick, County Courthouse, Frederick, Maryland [Land transfers]

14.   ÄÄ Crum & Davidson Engineers, "Plat of Property Belonging to M. S. Michael," 1912 [unpublished map in possession of the applicants]

15.   Durham, David A., Walk Through Darkness, Doubleday, 2002

16.   Encyclopedia Britannica, Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 1979

17.   Ä Engelbrecht, Jacob, The Diaries of Jacob Engelbrecht 1820-1890, William R. Quynn, editor, Paw Prints Publishers, Frederick, Maryland, 2001, [reprint]

18.   Ä Frederick County, Maryland, Street Map Book, Langenscheidt Publishing Group, Alexandria, Virginia, 19th edition, 2000

19.   ÄÄ Frederick News-Post [at the time, The Post], "Cooling Springs 205 Years In Michael Family," November 21, 1972

20.   Ä Frederick News-Post, "Historic home has had only four owners," page C-1, October 21, 2000

21.   Gara, Larry, "An Epic in United States History," in Underground Railroad, the National Park Service, Washington, DC, 1999

22.   Gewehr, Wesley M., Donald C. Gordon, David S. Sparks, and Roland N. Stromberg, The United States, A History of a Democracy, second edition, McGraw-Hill, 1960

23.   ÄÄ Goodhart, Briscoe, History of the Loudoun Rangers, Washington, DC, 1896.

24.   Ä Gordon, Paul and Rita, A Textbook History of Frederick County, Board of Education of Frederick County, Frederick, Maryland, 1975

25.   Ä Gordon, Paul and Rita, Frederick County, Maryland:  Never the Like Again, The Heritage Partnership, Frederick, Maryland, 1995.  This is a well-documented history of Frederick County, Maryland, from 1859 through 1865, concentrating on the Civil War.

26.   Ä Gordon, Paul, "Underground Railroad Stopped Here," The Gazette, Frederick, Maryland, May, 2002

27.   Greeley, Horace, The American Conflict: A History of the Great Rebellion in the United States of America,
1860-1865, O. D. Case & Company, Hartford, Connecticut, 1866

28.   ÄÄ Grove, William Jarboe, History of Carrollton Manor, Marken & Bielfeld, Frederick, Maryland,, 1928

29.   ÄÄ Haugh, Christopher, Up From the Meadows:  A History of Black Americans in Frederick County, [video tape], Frederick Cablevision, Frederick, Maryland, 1997

30.   Ä Haugh, Christopher, Up From the Meadows:  A History of Black Americans in Frederick County, [booklet accompanying video tape], Frederick Cablevision, Frederick, Maryland, 1997

31.   ÄÄ Henry, Rev. Thomas W., From Slavery to Salvation: The Autobiography of Reverend Thomas W. Henry of the A.M.E. Church, University of Mississippi Press, 1994

32.   ÄÄ Hickman, Margaret A., "Historical Sketch of Doubs and Community," in Michael: Revised Record as of May, 1982, privately published, 1982, and updated April, 1983

33.   ÄÄ Hickman, Margaret, Letter to Judge Edward S. Delaplaine, February 25, 1984

34.   ÄÄ Hickman, Margaret, Letter to Pierce Michael, February 28, 1984

35.   ÄÄ Hickman, Margaret A., Memory Lane, privately published, July 6, 1987

36.   Hogarth, George, General Steward, African Methodist Episcopal Church Magazine, vol. II, no. II, New York, August, 1844

37.   ÄÄ LaGrave, Jean Virts, Descendants of Jacob Michael, 1999

38.   ÄÄ Lake, D. J., Atlas of Frederick County, Maryland, C. O. Titus and Company, Philadelphia, 1873

39.   ÄÄ Lear, Donna, "Florence Virts Talks of Family's Underground Railroad Station," The Brunswick Citizen, Brunswick, Maryland, February 20, 2003

40.   ÄÄ Lebherz, Ann, letter to Peter H. Michael, May 15, 2003

41.   Ä Lebherz, Ann, unpublished list of Frederick County Underground Railroad sites, April 19, 2002

42.   Ä Lewis, Mark, "Garfield's Big Charlie Misner Was a Larger-Than-Life Legend, The Middletown Valley Citizen, Middletown, Maryland, April 26, 2001.

43.   ÄÄ Long, Helen, Index to Scharf's History of Western Maryland, volumes I and II, Clearfield Company.

44.   ÄÄ Michael, Andrew, II, untitled handwritten notebook, circa 1840-1850.  Kept in the permanent library collection of the Daughters of the American Revolution, Washington, DC.

45.   ÄÄ Michael, Antoinette, Genealogy of the Ancestors of Antoinette Michael, privately published, January 25, 1999

46.   ÄÄ Michael Strategic Analysis, Direct Testimony of Peter H. Michael on the Underground Railroad Route Running Through the Site of Duke Energy's Proposed Power Plant, testimony submitted in Maryland Public Service Commission case number 8891, April, 2002

47.   ÄÄ Michael Strategic Analysis, Substantiation of the Underground Railroad  Route from Point of Rocks to Doubs, Frederick County, Maryland, testimony submitted in Maryland Public Service Commission case no. 8891, April, 2002

48.   ÄÄ Michael, Harvey Neuman III, Letter to Jean Virts LaGrave, April 24, 1996

49.   ÄÄ Michael, Peter H., Nine Generations: The Michael Family, 1998, privately published, 1998

50.   ÄÄ Michael, Pierce, Letter to Margaret Hickman, March 4, 1984

51.   ÄÄ Michael, Samuel A., Letter to his nephew, Marion S. Michael I, and niece, Anna Michael Cline, January 1, 1890

52.   ÄÄ Michael, Samuel A., "Bicentennial Supplement," The Frederick News Post, August 5, 1975, p. 19 [reprinted from the original letter of Samuel Michael]

53.   ÄÄ Michael, Samuel A., "Reminiscences of the 19^th Century," The Frederick News Post, September 13, 1975, p. 24 [reprinted from the original letter of Samuel Michael]

54.   ÄÄ Michael, Samuel A., "The Doubs Countryside," The Frederick News Post, January 27, 1977, p. 4 [reprinted from the original letter of Samuel Michael]

55.   ÄÄ Michael, Samuel A., "Reminiscences," The Frederick News Post, January 27, 1977, p. 4 [reprinted from the original letter of Samuel Michael]

56.   National Park Service, Application of the Balch Library, Leesburg, Virginia, for listing in the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom, June 28, 2002

57.   National Park Service, Application of the Harpers Ferry National Historic Park, Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, for listing in the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom, December 31, 2001

58.   National Park Service, Application of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, Washington, DC, for listing of Oatlands Plantation, Leesburg, Virginia, in the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom, January, 2003

59.   Ä National Park Service, Application of the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal National Historical Park, Sharpsburg, Maryland, for listing of Ferry Hill in the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom, January 15, 2002

60.   National Park Service, Exploring a Common Past:  Researching and Interpreting the Underground Railroad, [second edition], 1998

61.   Ripley, C. Peter, "The Underground Railroad," in Underground Railroad, the National Park Service, Washington DC, 1999

62.   ÄÄ Scharf, John T., History of Western Maryland, Clearfield Company, 1968 [reprint]

63.   Ä Scheel, Eugene, "Journey to Freedom Was Risky for Slaves and Guides," Washington Post, May 27, 2001

64.   ÄÄ Scheel, Eugene, The Potomac River from Brunswick to Van Deventer's Island & Environs of Sugarloaf, Poolesville, Leesburg, Waterford & the German Settlement, [map], William & Heintz, Capitol Heights, Maryland, 1998

65.   Stevenson, Brenda E., "From Bondage to Freedom," in Underground Railroad, the National Park Service, Washington DC, 1999

66.   ÄÄ Still, William, The Underground Railroad, Porter & Coates, Philadelphia, 1872.  Reprinted by Johnson Publishing Company, 1970

67.   Stowe, Harriet Beecher, A Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin; Presenting the Original Facts and Documents Upon Which the Story Is Founded, John P. Jewett & Co., Boston,; Jewett, Proctor & Worthington, Cleveland; and Low and Company, London, 1853.  Reprinted by Applewood Books, 1998

68.   ÄÄ Thompson, John, The Life of John Thompson, a Fugitive Slave; Containing His History of 25 Years in Bondage, and His Providential Escape. Written by Himself, C. Hamilton Palladium Office, Worcester, Massachusetts, 1856

69.   ÄÄ Tracey, Grace L., and Dern, John P., Pioneers of Old Monocacy:  The Early Settlement of Frederick County, Maryland, 1721-1743, Clearfield Company, [reprint edition], 2001

70.   ÄÄ United States Bureau of the Census, Decennial Census of the United States for Buckeystown District, Frederick County, State of Maryland for 1850.

71.   ÄÄ United States Bureau of the Census, Decennial Census of the United States for Buckeystown District, Frederick County, State of Maryland for 1860.

72.   Ä Washington, Katina, Education of Blacks in Frederick County, senior project report, Hood College, April, 1996

73.    Ä Washington, Katina, Guide to Sources of African-American History In Frederick, senior project report, Hood College, May, 1996

74.   Ä Wayman, Bishop A.W., D.D., My Recollections of African M.E. Ministers, or Forty Years Experience an the African Methodist Episcopal Church, A.M.E. Book Rooms, Philadelphia, 1881

75.   Ä Webster, Donovan, "Traveling the long road to freedom, one step at a time", Smithsonian, October, 1996

76.   ÄÄ Williams, T.J.C., and McKinsey, F., "Franklin Esterday Michael," History of Frederick County, Titsworth Co., 1910

77.   ÄÄ Williams, T.J.C., and McKinsey, F., "John Lambert Michael," History of Frederick County, Titsworth Co., 1910

78.   ÄÄ Williams, T.J.C., and McKinsey, F., "Marion S. Michael," History of Frederick County, Titsworth & Co., 1910

79.   ÄÄ Williams, T.J.C., and McKinsey, F., "William O. Michael," History of Frederick County, Titsworth & Co., 1910.

80.   Willis, Agnes, letter to William Still, January 28, 1856, as provided in his The Underground Railroad, Porter & Coates, Philadelphia, 1872

Web Sites

1.      http://catoctinaqueduct.org

2.      http://CoolingSprings.org

3.      http://cr.nps.gov/  [The National Park Service]

4.      http://cr.nps.gov/aahistory/ugrr/ugrr.htm

5.      http://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/neh.html

6.      Http://fourr.org  [Friends of the Underground Railroad]

7.      http://FreedomRailroad.com  [Peter H. Michael's book on the Underground Railroad]

8.      http://geocities.com/heartland/bluffs/5925/1.html

9.      http://kepplerassociates.com/speakers/cohenanthony.asp?2

10.   http://mc-mncppc.org/

11.   http://mdarchives.state.md.us/msa/refserv/html/afridesc.html

12.   http://mdhs.org/explore/baltcivilwar.html

13.   http://nationalgeographic.com/railroad/index.html

14.   http://niica.on.ca/csonan/underrailway.htm

15.   http://npca.org/walk.html

16.   http://nps.gov/choh/index.htm  [The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park]

17.   http://nps.gov/undergroundrr/contents.htm  [The Network to Freedom]

18.   http://pointorocks.ang-md.org/history.html

19.   http://rootsweb.com/

20.   http://sandyspringmuseum.org

21.   http://shop.nationalgeographic.com

22.   http://state.vt.us/vhs/educate/timeline.htm

23.   http://ugrr.org

24.   http://ugrr.org/adopt/oakley.htm

25.   http://undergroundrailroad.org/apps/search/index.asp

26.   http://undergroundrailroad.org/content

27.   http://urrfreepress.com  [Underground Railroad Free Press]

COOLING SPRINGS FARM

Underground Railroad Sites in Frederick County, Maryland

As of mid-2009, 61 confirmed or suspected Underground Railroad safe-houses and routes had been identified in Frederick County, Maryland.   Of these, 39 are confirmed or very likely Underground Railroad sites shown in red below, and the others shown in blue are putative sites based on their likelihood of having been involved in the Underground Railroad. Of the confirmed sites, 23 are mentioned in two or more documentary sources.   Shown below is a map of Underground Railroad safe-houses and routes in Frederick County, Maryland.  Cooling Springs Farm is in the red cluster at the bottom of the map.

COOLING SPRINGS FARM

An American Family of the Underground Railroad, by Peter Michael

Now rare nearly 150 years after the end of the uplifting national phenomenon known as the Underground Railroad are the very few intact family accounts of Underground Railroad safe-house operators.  This book tells the story of the extensively documented experiences of the family of author Peter Michael in sheltering Underground Railroad freedom seekers, and the reconnection after 150 years with the descendants of a freedom seeker who passed through the Underground Railroad safe-house at the author's Cooling Springs Farm, now an Underground Railroad historic site open to the public.

To read more about An American Family of the Underground Railroad and/or to purchase the book, go to its web site here.

To order the book on line from Amazon, click here.
 
To order the book on line at Barnes and Noble, click here.

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Guide to Freedom: Rediscovering the Underground Railroad In One United States County,
 Peter Michael's most recent book

Only in the last few years have a few places around the country begun to research and catalogue their Underground Railroad sites to rediscover what the Underground Railroad looked like geographically. While upstate New York, eastern Kansas and the Philadelphia area have made good strides in this important rediscovery, very little has been done in border or southern states where research is much more difficult.  Peter Michael's Guide to Freedom newly identifies 61 safe-houses and routes in Maryland's Frederick County with its key routes linking Virginia and Pennsylvania.  Breaking more new ground, Guide to Freedom is believed to be the first Underground Railroad book to rate sites according to their likelihood of authenticity.

To read more about Guide to Freedom and/or to purchase the book, go to its web site here.

To order the book on line from Amazon, click here.

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