Eliot Ness

Eliot Ness was a famous American lawman.

He was born on April 19, 1903, in Chicago, Illinois. His parents were immigrants from Norway. They ran a small bakery for their family. Ness went to Christian Fenger High School. Later, he studied at the University of Chicago. He graduated in 1925 with a degree in business and politics.

Before his famous work, he worked as an investigator for a credit company. He also took a special course in criminology in 1929. This class was taught by a man named August Vollmer. Vollmer wanted to make police work more professional. These ideas stayed with Ness for his whole life.

In 1926, Ness joined the Bureau of Prohibition. This was a group of 1,000 agents. Their job was to enforce Prohibition, which meant making alcohol illegal. In 1930, a man named Frank J. Loesch asked the President to stop a crime boss named Al Capone. Other agents were already looking into Capone for not paying his taxes. A plan was made to use a small team of agents. This team would target illegal breweries and supply paths. U.S. attorney George E.Q. Johnson chose the 27-year-old Ness to lead this squad. Ness said a group called the Secret Six helped him get the job.

Ness wanted a team that could not be bribed. He checked the records of all agents to find honest men.

He started with six men and grew the group to about ten. People called them "The Untouchables." This nickname came because criminals tried to bribe or scare them, but they refused. The team used wiretapping to listen to secret phone calls. They raided illegal breweries starting in March 1931. These raids cost Capone millions of dollars in lost money. Because of this work, Capone was eventually sent to prison for tax evasion. Ness even helped take Capone to the train to go to prison.

Ness moved to Cleveland, Ohio, in 1934. In 1935, the mayor hired him as the Safety Director. This meant he was in charge of the police and the fire departments. He worked to modernize the police and make streets safer. He also fought against organized crime in the city. Later, Ness worked in Washington, D.C., for the federal government. He also worked for a security company called Diebold Corporation. However, his later years were quite hard. He had trouble making enough money and worked many different jobs. He even worked as a clerk in a bookstore.

Ness wrote a book about his life called *The Untouchables*. He worked on this book with Oscar Fraley.

The book was published after he died in 1957. It sold 1.5 million copies and made him a legend. Many movies and TV shows were made about his life. One famous TV show starred an actor named Robert Stack. Ness died of a heart attack at age 54.

His ashes were scattered in a pond in Cleveland. An admirer later built a stone monument for him at Lake View Cemetery.