Somerfield, Pennsylvania: stagecoach stop on the National Road (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9798272172471)

Before the existence of the Underground Railroad had even reached the public consciousness, it was alive and well, and fully functioning in Somerfield, PA. A stop on the National Road for both wagons and stage coaches in the 19th Century, and a resort town surrounded by the mountains of southwestern Pennsylvania until a dam was built on the Youghiogheny River condemning the town to a watery grave, its main feature in the old days was a stone tavern and inn, owned by a man who also owned slaves. Follow his transformation from determined slave-catcher to a man whose Christmas Epiphany compels him to free his own slaves, the children of whom had grown up with his own decidedly Abolitionist brood. The story includes three romances involving the elder children, including one compulsory interracial wedding and how it might have been handled in the constraints of the times. Though some of the subject matter is based upon a painful era in United States history, the story is told with touches of humor where appropriate.