On a chilly October night beneath Market Avenue, west of downtown Cleveland, visitors followed tour guide Veronica Bagley through a trapdoor-lined floor and down a narrow staircase into a basement where she warned some guests have seen things nobody can explain.

The walls of Great Lakes Brewing Company have stories to tell, if you know where to listen. From the creak of old floorboards to the whisper of wind through trapdoors, every corner of this historic Ohio City building hints at its past. Step inside, and you’re walking through layers of history: a German feed-and-seed store, a jazz club, a French-style restaurant and even a hotel once known as The Elton. Some say the walls themselves remember. And sometimes, those memories linger.

Veronica Bagley, gift shop and tours manager, guides visitors through the brewery, sharing both historical and haunted details. 

“I actually started working at Great Lakes as a part-time tour guide,” Bagley said. “I grew up around craft beer, and with a background in history and anthropology, I thought being a tour guide and educating people about craft beer would be the perfect fit.”

Market Avenue is no stranger to ghost stories. Close to Lake Erie, the Market Avenue Wine Bar, built in the 1860s, has long reported paranormal activity. Across the street, old brick storefronts from Cleveland’s immigrant brewery district still whisper their own legends, emphasized by unexplained sound of footsteps and mysterious cold spots. 

Bagley said the brewery’s haunted reputation began with workers from the Schlather era which refers to the company founded by Leonard Schlather in 1857 and operated independently under his leadership until he sold it in 1902. The Schlather brewery building was then operated by the Cleveland & Sandusky Brewing Co. until Prohibition began in 1919.

The tour starts in The Rockefeller Room, a nod to the local legend that John D. Rockefeller once worked as a bookkeeper in the building, though records don't support the claim. Today, the space is rented for private events and occasionally used for dining. The room’s past is woven into the floors and walls. In 1901, the building became the Herman McClean feed-and-seed store, which operated until 1971. The first floor, now the main entrance to the brewery, once served as the storefront, while the basement stored feed bags.

Visitors during the haunted history events are given EMF detectors and dousing rods, tools intended to sense electrical disturbances and subtle movements, said to be remnants of energy that some say lingered long after the building’s original occupants departed.

Staff recount hearing footsteps and seeing glassware shift in the rarely used room, echoing the building’s layered life as offices and apartments through the decades.
 

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The Market Room sits inside the oldest building on the Great Lakes Brewing Company property — formerly the Market Street Exchange, which was built in 1872 and once owned by banker Dan Rodgers. After Rodgers sold it in the early 1900s, the building continued operating under its original name until Prohibition shut it down in the 1920s. The Salvation Army later moved into the first floor, while the second and third floors remained apartments accessible by two narrow staircases still visible today. Tour staff believe a family once lived in the third‑floor apartment, a theory supported by unsettling activity recorded during paranormal investigations. 

Bagley said she was counting inventory alone one night when she heard faint music drifting from upstairs, followed by the unmistakable sound of someone sprinting down the apartment staircase behind her.

“It was loud,” she said. “I locked the door and immediately heard running.” 

The experience sent her fleeing down the opposite steps, an encounter later supported by Tri-C investigators who believe a playful presence uses those staircases as its path. Between its Prohibition-era history, repurposed apartments and decades of layered activity, the Market Room holds both the physical structure and the lingering echoes of its past.

Outside the Market Room, the history of the building is etched into its facade. A restored sign above the entrance reads “Lloyd & Keys,” honoring a pre-Prohibition Cleveland brewery, with “Dan Rogers, Proprietor” inscribed below – a direct connection to the original owner of the Market Street Exchange. A sealed-off doorway marks what would have been the private entrance to the upstairs apartments, allowing tenants to enter without passing through the bar. 

Paranormal activity isn’t confined to the interior. Staff speak of glasses mysteriously tumbling from the bar when no one was near them, including one particularly startling evening when stacked pint glasses fell as if shoved, while wine glasses and liquor bottles remained untouched. 

Though the bar has seen its share of real-life danger, including a shooting incident during a notoriously rough period in the neighborhood, the spirits that linger here remain unexplained, playful yet unnerving reminders of the building’s checkered past.
 

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The main entrance opens into what was originally the first floor of Herman McLean’s Feed and Seed store. Visitors are greeted by the preserved charm of the building, including an original scale behind the host stand. In the back corner sits a small booth with the original columns, once the cashier station where customers checked out after purchasing feed.
 

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Beneath the floor mat is a tiny cutout, revealing a trap door that leads down to the basement, part of the original functional design of the store. Above, a hole in the ceiling hints at a crane system once used to move heavy feed bags. Customers would have had their purchases weighed, checked out at the cashier booth and sent on their way, a simple yet efficient operation preserved in these architectural details.

In addition to these historic features, the building houses Great Lakes Brewing Company’s original brewing system. From 1988 to 1992, the smaller setup, crafted by Charlie Price of Schmitten Sons Brewing Company, produced early brews including Dorm Under Gold and Elliot Ness, named after the legendary Prohibition-era FBI agent. Today, it is still used for public-exclusive beers, linking the brewery’s modern operations to its historical roots.
 

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Perhaps the most chilling stop is the pub cellar, open for weekend events and seasonal pop-ups. For Halloween, it was transformed into a witch-themed bar with decorations sponsored by Wicked. In the winter, it becomes a festive Christmas space.
 

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The Pub Cellar sits beneath what was once the basement jazz club of the short‑lived 1970s Market Street Exchange, a French‑style restaurant upstairs with live jazz below. While the concept was ahead of its time for Ohio City, the business didn’t last, and by 1976 both buildings were abandoned until Great Lakes Brewing Company purchased them in the 1980s. 

Guests can still see the bottom of the original trap door overhead, a direct connection to the building’s feed‑and‑seed past. But the space is known just as much for its paranormal activity as its history. The cellar is considered one of the brewery’s most active areas, with reports of both intelligent and residual hauntings.

One lingering spirit is a woman who silently walks the room. No one has ever communicated with her, but staff believe she may be connected to the building’s past, possibly even Ava Herman, the 74‑year‑old woman who died next door, though nothing has been confirmed.

The most beloved spirit, however, is Terry Ryan, Great Lakes’ very first tour guide. A notorious prankster in life and adored by longtime staff, Terry’s presence became unmistakable during a paranormal investigation. When a bartender recognized the familiar feel of the responses coming through the dowsing rods and EMF detector, she exclaimed, “I think it’s Terry!” and instantly, the EMF lit up and the rods crossed. 

When the tour guide asked, “Terry, why are you here?” the rods swung sharply toward the bar at the same time, an answer so perfectly in character that staff still laugh about it. Since then, small mischievous incidents in the cellar are often credited to him. To many who knew him, his presence felt comforting.
 

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The tour concludes in the Gift Shop, located in the Elton Building, the newest of the three, though it still dates back to 1889. Originally built by Charles Herman, the structure was originally known as the Herman Building and served primarily as apartments or boarding houses, housing employees from the nearby Schlather Brewing Company. 

In the early 1900s, it became the Elton Building, or Elton Hotel, with a bar on the first floor called the Silver Dollar Saloon. The upper floors included rentable rooms and the Palace, a burlesque show on the fourth floor, giving the building a colorful history that hints at some of the paranormal activity reported.

During a paranormal investigation, activity in the Gift Shop proved subtle but unmistakable. While using EMF detectors and flashlights, one of the tour guides, Sarah, a self-described skeptic, experienced repeated activity from a flashlight positioned near the register. The flashlight continually turned on and off by itself, even after investigators took it apart and could not find anything to suggest the behavior.

Veronica, conducting the investigation, captured the phenomenon on video, providing a rare glimpse of the building’s lingering presence. The Gift Shop sits atop a history of apartments, bars and entertainment, and even in its modern retail form, echoes of its past lives seem to persist.

“It’s subtle, but it makes the history feel alive,” Bagley said, wrapping up the tour.

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