'Yes,' he said, and shivered. 'Well, send him in.'
A Tip of the Fedora
As was the case with the two previous Eliot Ness novels, The Dark City (1987) and Butcher's Dozen (1988), I could not have written this book without the support and advice of my friend and research associate George Hagenauer. George and I have made several research trips to Cleveland, where we visited many of the sites of the action in this novel. We have had numerous sessions at the Western Reserve Historical Society, where the Ness papers are kept. We are both grateful to the helpful personnel at the Historical Society, City Hall municipal reference library, and Cleveland Public Library.
Despite its extensive basis in history, this is a work of fiction, and some liberties have been taken with the facts; the remarkably eventful life of Eliot Ness defies the necessarily tidy shape of a novel, and for that reason I have again compressed time, occasionally reordered events, and used composite characters.
Readers of Butcher's Dozen may wish to note that the action of this novel takes place in the period of time filling the gap between sections one and two of that novel.
Some characters, like Sam Wild and Albert Curry, are wholly fictional, although they do have real-life counterparts. Wild represents the many reporter friends of Ness, particularly Clayton Fritchey of the Press, who, like the fictional Wild, were assigned to cover Ness full-time; and Ralph Kelly of the Plain Dealer, who also covered the City Hall beat.
Big Jim Caldwell and Little Jim McFate are primarily based upon Don Campbell and John McGee, although neither of these notorious convicted felons were ever linked to the death of Arthur Whitelock, the real-life counterpart of Jack Whitehall. Whitelock's murder remains unsolved, although it was obviously tied to his unconventional union-organizing activities.
Harry Gibson is a fictional character, although he has several real-life counterparts in Cleveland labor racketeering circles of the 1930s. Specifically, the extortion racket at the food terminal (and Eliot Ness's investigation thereof) is based closely on fact, although dates have been shifted.
Among the historical figures included here under their real names are Mayor Harold Burton (whose congratulatory letter to Ness as it appears in this novel is a verbatim transcription, with the exception of the substitution of the names 'Caldwell and McFate' for 'Campbell and McGee'); Chief George Matowitz; Executive Assistant Safety Director Robert Chamberlin; Captain John Savage; Elmer Irey; Judge Alva Cortlett; and Prosecutor Frank T. Cullitan. Mentioned in passing, Frank Nitti and Louis Campagna of course existed; and the names of Eliot Ness's family members used herein are the real ones.
Will Garner, the former 'untouchable,' is based upon Bill Gardner, who was indeed on Ness's Chicago Capone squad. To my knowledge, Gardner did not work with Ness in Cleveland; but according to several sources, including Oscar Fraley's Four Against the Mob, at least one former 'untouchable' was on the safety director's staff of investigators. But Ness did not publicize the names of his investigators, who were nicknamed in the press 'the unknowns,' a name that did not catch on in the manner of 'the untouchables.' Fraley implies in his slightly fictionalized book (most names are changed, for instance, and some dates) that this staff member was Paul Robsky; but in Robsky's own self-aggrandizing autobiography (co-written with Fraley), The Last of the Untouchables (1962), a work which outrageously all but omits Eliot Ness from the story of that famed squad, Robsky makes no mention of having worked in Cleveland. I chose to use Gardner as the basis for the ex-'untouchable' on the Cleveland staff because, frankly, I found him the most interesting of Ness's Chicago investigative team.
Among the fictional characters in this book who have real-life counterparts are George Owens, Frank Darby, Cyril Easton, Mrs. Jack Whitehall, Sergeant Martin Merlo, David Cowley, Evelyn MacMillan, Joe McFarlin, and various incidental characters.
Vernon Gordon is a fictional character designed to represent (but not depict specifically) the Stouffer brothers, Vernon and Gordon. It was the now enormously successful international Stouffer's chain whose Playhouse Square restaurant renovation was the extortion and vandalism target of Don Campbell and John McGee. And it was the cooperation of the Stouffer brothers with Eliot Ness and Prosecutor Cullitan that made the case against Campbell and McGee possible; the Stouffers were indeed the state's star witnesses.
The major research source for this book was the files of various Cleveland newspapers of the day; but a number of books have been consulted as well.
Sources for the labor union aspect of this novel include: Dynamite (1934), Louis Adamic; Labor-Turbulent Years (1969), Irving Bernstein; Strike! (1972), Jeremy Brecher; in As Steel Goes,… Unionism a Basic Industry (1940), Robert R. R. Brooks; Teamster Rebellion (1972), Farrell Dobbs; and Teamster Politics (1975), Farrell Dobbs. Also, Union Guy (1946) by Edward Fountain provided ideas for the background of Jack Whitehall.
Four Against the Mob (1961) by Oscar Fraley, the co-author with Ness himself of The Untouchables (1957), is the only book-length nonfiction work on Ness in Cleveland to date. As mentioned previously, Fraley changed names and did some minor fictionalizing, apparently for legal reasons, and tended not to explore Ness as a man, possibly out of deference to Betty Ness, Ness's widow (and third wife). Nonetheless, his book remains a helpful basic source to me and I am grateful to Mr. Fraley for his work.
Ness has not yet been the subject of a book-length biography, but a number of excellent articles about him have been written by Cleveland journalists. Undoubtedly the best, and probably the single most helpful source to me, is the article by Peter Jeddick, collected in his Cleveland: Where the East Coast Meets the Midwest (1980). Also excellent is the article 'The Last American Hero,' by George E. Condon, published in Cleveland Magazine (August 1987); Condon's book Cleveland: The Best Kept Secret, includes a fine chapter on Ness as well, 'Cleveland's Untouchable.' Also helpful is the unpublished article written in 1983 for the Cleveland Police Historical Society, 'Eliot Ness: A Man of a Different Era,' by Anthony J. Coyne and Nancy L. Huppert. And extremely valuable is the unpublished, twenty-two-page article written by Ness himself on his Capone days, prepared as background material for co-author/ghost Fraley on The Untouchables.
Other references include Cleveland: Prodigy of the Western Reserve (1979), George E. Condon; Yesterday's Cleveland (1976), George E. Condon; The Tax Dodgers (1948), Elmer L. Irey and William J. Slocum; Cleveland Architecture 1876–1979 (1979), Eric Johannesen; Scientific Investigation and Physical Evidence (1959), Leland V. Jones; Cleveland-Confused City on a Seesaw (1976), Philip W. Porter; To Market to Market (1981), Joanne M. Lewis and John Szilagyi; and Criminal Investigation (1974), Paul B. Weston and Kenneth M. Wells.
A tip of the fedora to Joyce Magyar of Mid-American Glass of Davenport, Iowa, for the impromptu tour and for providing helpful information; and to contractor Chuck Bunn, for information regarding the construction business.
Finally, I would like to thank my editor Coleen O'Shea and her associate Becky Cabaza for providing a solid, enthusiastic support system; my agent Dominick Abel, for his counsel and friendship; and my wife Barbara Collins, whose love, help, and support make the work possible.
