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One week after the raid on McGinty's when the front-page stories about Ness were
starting to wind down, he was back in the headlines again with a new campaign. This time,
he had taken aim at extortion and racketeering at the Northern Ohio Food Terminal. Ness
and a special squad of investigators had assembled evidence in 45 cases of intimidation,
coercion and assault of farmers and truck drivers delivering food to the terminal.
A group of thugs calling itself a labor union was forcing food producers to pay tribute
of up to 45 cents a minute for unloading trucks at the terminal or face beatings,
destruction of their vehicles and loss of their cargo. Previously, police squad cars that
had been called to protect the haulers and their property turned away and left the victims
to fend for themselves rather than be attacked by the gangsters.
Ness's report, which he handed over to his friend Cullitan, the county prosecutor,
indicated that producers were being forced to pay two men for a minimum of four hours of
work to unload even small trucks. If the farmers tried to unload their trucks themselves,
they were beaten and chased out of town. The result was that many farmers stopped coming
to the Cleveland market and those that paid the exorbitant rates were forced to pass the
costs on to the wholesalers, who in turn charged higher prices to retailers and consumers.
While many of the items in Ness's report would not surprise anyone familiar with union
practices in the past few decades, the violence and excessive demands by the produce
handlers was shocking to people in the 1930's. This particular investigation into labor
racketeering was the beginning of a long, controversial crusade that was to affect Ness's
career long after his tenure of safety director.
While the citizens of Cleveland could not help but be impressed by the daily record of
Eliot Ness's accomplishments in the newspaper, the tireless workaholic had very little
time to spend at home with his wife. After the most exhausting schedule during the day, he
spent most evenings working until quite late. Instead of going home to let off steam, he
often went drinking with his newspaper friends. Edna had assumed that after a few months
on the job, Eliot would slack up a little and lead a more normal life. She didn't want her
needs to interfere with his success in his new position, considering how important it was
to him.
These were exciting times for a city recovering from the depths of the Depression.
Every indicator was pointing upward. The conventions and the Expo kept the excitement
running continuously throughout the summer of 1936. The city was preparing for President
Roosevelt's upcoming visit to the Great Lakes Expo as part of his 1936 election campaign.
Never in recent history did Cleveland have so many positive things going for it all at one
time.
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