On July 30, Lilly Gerrits stands in a field in Addison, Michigan. While it doesn’t look like much now, in the midnineteenth century this was the location of the Woodstock Manual Labor Institute—a school for Black children, and a stop on the Underground Railroad. The school was founded in 1844 by Prior Foster, a born-free Black man, and although it was only open for a little over a decade, its impact on the community is part of Michigan’s history—a history that is still being written.
Gerrits was one of two U-M History undergraduate interns who joined the Michigan History Center in the summer of 2025 to conduct research on significant sites, and write nominations for these sites to be added to the National Underground Railroad Network.
In 1998, Congress passed the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom Act, which established a program within the National Park Service that “honors, preserves and promotes the history of resistance to enslavement through escape and flight, which continues to inspire people worldwide.”
That same year, the state of Michigan also created the Michigan Freedom Trail Commission, housed in the Michigan History Center, which supports this mission within the state and holds an annual gathering.
In early 2023, Angela Dillard, former chair of the History department, was serving on the Michigan Freedom Trail Commission when she had the idea to develop an internship program at U-M.
The internship would give students a chance to conduct research on a specific place, event, or individual with ties to the Underground Railroad, and draft a nomination for their subject to be added to the national database.
Sandra Clark, director of the Michigan History Center, had worked with interns before on other projects, and agreed that this was a great idea.
“We chose the nominations as ideal projects for the length of a summer internship, time to read some secondary material about a topic, do primary research to learn more, and write a nomination,” Clark explained.
“This gives the students the opportunity to create a completed project that strengthens their history research skills, creates something of lasting value to the public and other scholars, and can be used as they enter the job market to show a public history project they did, not just something they were a part of.”
In the inaugural year, Grace Kruse and Anna Thomas were hired, and quickly got to work researching the Greensky Hill Indian United Methodist Church and burial site of William Swan in Charlevoix, and the Crosswhite family’s story in Marshall. By the end of the summer they had submitted their nominations, but it wasn’t until March of 2025 when Clark was able to give them the good news that their sites had been approved and added to the national database.
This internship really helped me to understand the many different ways of researching history, as well as the ways that research can be translated to an audience
Sara Desmet and Michael Delphia interned in the summer of 2024, and heard of their nominations’ success much sooner—they even made the local news.
An article in MLive posted in October of that year described the sites, “Michigan’s new sites are Oak Hill Cemetery where Perry Sanford is buried and the former site of the Erastus and Sarah Hussey Store and House.”
Sandford escaped enslavement in Kentucky and travelled north, landing in Battle Creek where he found work in a factory, and became a well-known figure in the community. The Husseys, also located in Battle Creek, were dedicated abolitionists who provided food and shelter to freedom seekers.
This summer, Gerrits, a recent graduate, and sophomore Naida McCoy got to work on their own nominations.
While Gerrits was uncovering more about the Woodstock Institute, McCoy chose to research Henry Bibb (1815-1854), a self-emancipated abolitionist and lecturer born in Shelby County, Kentucky, and his connection to the national antislavery movement during his time in Detroit.
“I was surprised by the number of records I was able to find,” McCoy said, “including Bibb’s will, which he wrote shortly before he died and is now located in the Archives of Michigan, where I viewed it on microfilm.”
Gerrits and McCoy both worked on-site in Lansing most Mondays in their own office within the MHC, and spent the rest of the week travelling to archives, relevant site locations, and doing online research.
“Foster had moved around a lot during his life,” Gerrits said, “and there were a lot of different places outside of Michigan that he was connected to. I enjoyed visiting these places and finding Foster’s story between them!”
The Network to Freedom accepts site nominations twice a year with a summer deadline of July 15. Clark and other staff at the MHC all provided support for the interns as they worked towards this submission goal. Then, it’s a matter of waiting to find out if the nominations were successful.“
All four of the nominations prepared in the first two years of the program have been approved by the Network to Freedom committee and listed,” Clark said, excited about the internship program’s success. “And every student has found information that we did not know about before their work began.”
For the students, while they’re optimistic about their proposals, the experience was worth it no matter the outcome.
“This internship really helped me to understand the many different ways of researching history, as well as the ways that research can be translated to an audience,” said Gerrits.
And for Clark, the program has been just as beneficial for the MHC.
“It has been a privilege to work with undergraduate students who, with a little guidance, have done such good graduate level historical research and analysis. And this is from someone who bleeds green and white!”
This article was originally published in the 2025 print magazine, History Matters.
