Michael Cowan Farber

Michael Cowan Farber passed away peacefully in Braintree, Massachusetts, on the eve of the Harvest Moon on September 28, 2023, after a long battle with Parkinson's disease at the age of 72.

Michael was born in Baltimore, Maryland on July 12, 1951, the third child of Dawson L. Farber, Jr. and Mary Patricia Stokes Farber. Michael attended Gilman School, graduating with the Class of 1970. He was captain of the varsity football and lacrosse teams in his senior year and was recognized as the "most likely to succeed" by his classmates, no doubt on the basis of his tenacity in sports, his business acumen, and his fearless hunger for new experiences and adventure. In July 1969, he hitchhiked to Cape Canaveral to see the launch of Apollo 11 and one month later, hitchhiked to Woodstock. Michael drove an Austin Healey Sprite - a convertible, of course, and was an avid sailor throughout his youth. He could most often be found on Town Cove, Cape Cod Bay or Pleasant Bay racing the family's O'Day Day Sailer (known as the 8-ball or 880).

Michael met Elizabeth Gaines in 1971 and they moved to West Virginia where Michael's father was born. Their first child, Kina, was delivered in 1972 in a little town in New Hampshire by one of very few doctors who would perform home births. They eventually settled in Glenville, West Virginia where Michael attended Glenville State College. Through a college program, Michael was selected to serve as an intern to West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals Justice Darrell V. McGraw, Jr. and the "Judge" became a life-long mentor and friend.

When Judge McGraw was assaulted by the sheriff's deputies and arrested in October 1979 while attempting to inspect a jail in Kanawha County where a juvenile had committed suicide the week before, Michael, then a college intern, was by the Judge's side. This event had a profound impact on Michael.

Following his graduation in 1980 with a degree in history, Michael promptly enrolled in West Virginia University College of Law and obtained a Juris Doctorate degree in 1983. Their second child, Katherine (Kate), was born in 1982 during Michael's second year finals.

Michael and Elizabeth built a home on a mountaintop in Sutton, West Virginia in 1982 and resided there for the rest of their marriage. Their third daughter, Brooke, arrived in 1987. Michael practiced law first in Webster Springs with Ernest V. ("Jack") Morton and later in Sutton until his retirement in 2005. Michael was a strong advocate for working people and the underdog. No client was unworthy of the strongest defense possible, regardless of their ability to pay. Michael was not afraid of taking on the coal companies and public officials.

In 1986, Michael won an important Freedom of Information Act case in the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals that created a new major point of law concerning the FOIA privacy exemption. The case has been cited many times by numerous courts.

Michael was a community builder and activist. Michael held many interests and loves throughout his life including history, geography, geology, maps, traveling, the weather, sailing, dogs, Super-8 filmmaking, woodworking, the state of West Virginia, Cape Cod, and stonemasonry to name a few. He could not pass by an ancient stone wall without admiring its beauty.

Michael moved to Cape Cod, Massachusetts in 2005 to assist his parents in the renovation and remodeling of their long-time summer home in Brewster. Michael lived for a time in Chatham and then Orleans. Michael then embarked on the final stage of his life as a historian and educator. Michael was captivated by the work of Morse Payne, who wrote extensively on the history of the early colonists in Massachusetts and the establishment and layout of the towns in and around Massachusetts and Cape Cod Bays. In 2008, Michael founded the "Cornerstone Project," which served as his model to educate others on the precepts that had been developed by Payne in his writings. Michael became a fixture at the Cape Cod Lighthouse Charter School.

If each of us is to be remembered by our friends, family, and fellow travelers, Michael without a doubt will be remembered by his magnetic personality, love of the sea, passion for early Cape Cod history, and most of all, his love of his children and grandchildren and the legacy he leaves with them.

Michael is survived by his former wife Elizabeth Gaines Farber (Charleston, WV). He was immensely proud of his three daughters, Kina (Manuel) Martin (Charlotte, NC), Kate (Daniel) Gold (Old Brookville, NY), and Brooke Farber (Charleston, WV). Michael was the grandfather of six, Sofia and Nicolas Martin and Stella, Tess, Farrah and Molly Gold. Michael is survived by his siblings Dawson Farber III (Eastham, MA), Peter (Kim) Farber (Chatham, MA), Lorinda (Brad) Routon (Henniker, NH), Mark Farber (Harwich, MA), and Jonathan (Bonnie) Farber (Owings Mills, MD), and many nieces and nephews. Michael was preceded in death by his parents, Mary Patricia Stokes and Dawson L. Farber, Jr.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research.

A celebration of his life will be held in the Summer of 2024 on Cape Cod.