CLE Myths: Eliot Ness Bullet Holes

It’s hard not to notice the bullet holes embedded in the mahogany bar in Great Lakes Brewing Co.’s brewpub.

“People ask about them all the time,” says co-founder Patrick Conway, laughing. What really gets Clevelanders talking, though, is what caused them — and whether or not Eliot Ness was involved.

“The rumors started decades ago,” says Conway. Ness, who led the Untouchables in taking down Al Capone, became Cleveland’s safety director in 1935. Back then, what’s now Great Lakes was known as Market Tavern. “This was a rough-and-tumble neighborhood,” says Conway, “so some bullet holes come as no surprise.”

Even so, the story goes that Ness was a Market Tavern-regular and the bullets were either intended for him or fired by him.

But Rebecca McFarland, an internationally recognized Ness expert and historian, questions that. “It wasn’t the type of place Eliot would have gone,” she says. “If he wanted to have a drink and socialize, which he did, it would have been in one of our gorgeous hotel ballrooms.”

Plus, Conway remembers his mother (who was Ness’ stenographer) saying that the director never wore a gun, casting doubt on the idea he accidentally fired it.

And as for anyone shooting at Ness? “If that had been true, it certainly would have made headlines in our daily papers,” says McFarland, “and it didn’t.

Status: Undecided

Read More: Click here to read the full list of 30 Myths That Define Cleveland