The Cozad-Bates House Interpretive Center

The Cozad-Bates House Interpretive Center. . , The Underground Railroad was neither a railroad, nor was it underground. The name symbolizes the secrecy required to participate in an illegal activity. Before the Civil War, what we now call university circle was rural farmland and home to residents active in the Underground Railroad. The Cozad-Bates House is the only building left from this time in the area's history., If this house could talk, it would tell us stories of the brave freedom seekers and abolitionists all around it. Sadly, many of those stories were hidden and then lost. The stories that survived were recorded decades later and they rely on the memories of participants or their descendants. Since the activities of the Underground Railroad were illegal, those who participated kept very few records about how it operated. Those who assisted freedom seekers risked harsh prosecution under the law. For those escaping slavery, capture and return meant brutal punishment and a continued life of bondage., We don't know if freedom seekers took refuge in this house. We do know that brave individuals came together in Northeast Ohio to challenge an evil, race-based system of slavery in the decades before the Civil War. These diverse activists were black and white, rich and poor, born into slavery and born free. We also know that courageous people seeking freedom passed through this area. Proof of their journeys can be found among their descendants in Canada. There were people who took great risks to be free and people who took great risks to help them., What would you have done?