Originally from Jackson County, Illinois, Michael Tow is a history and language arts teacher living in Seattle. He holds both a bachelor's and a master's degree in American History from Southern Illinois University and aside from an intense interest in his own family history, Michael has published on the contribution of self-liberated enslaved people to the Union Navy during the Civil War and biographies of several Major League Baseball players from southern Illinois. Michael is a former assistant editor of the Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society and is a life-long member of the Jackson County (Illinois) Historical Society.

Originally from Jackson County, Illinois, Michael Tow is a history and language arts teacher living in Seattle. He holds both a bachelor's and a master's degree in American History from Southern Illinois University and aside from an intense interest in his own family history, Michael has published on the contribution of self-liberated enslaved people to the Union Navy during the Civil War and biographies of several Major League Baseball players from southern Illinois. Michael is a former assistant editor of the Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society and is a life-long member of the Jackson County (Illinois) Historical Society.