When threatened, desperate and angry men do sometimes make less than ideal choices. Rick Hollis has more reason to be angry at Lewiston’s overlords than most people may know. Mr. Hollis’ great-grandmother was horribly slaughtered in a Turkish ethnic cleansing of the Armenians. His grandparents emigrated to the United States and, according to their son, Henry Hollis, “got off the train in Lewiston because that was as far as what money they had would take them.”

Rick Hollis’ grandfather built Lewiston Radiator Works and the then-respectable Holly Hotel. As the city of Lewiston sank into ill repair, so did the Holly. Unlike a few business owners during Lewiston’s worst years, Henry Hollis, inheritor of both businesses, held onto his buildings and paid his share into the city’s treasury. After a desperate and angry fight with the city of Lewiston, he lost a building he owned on Park Street to eminent domain.

Now, third generation business owner Rick Hollis is being bullied by the city he and his father and his grandfather have supported. His anger and lingering memory of being in his radiator repair shop when an old leaky gas main under the city’s street blew his buildings away may have pushed him and his message a little off center, but it has certainly given it the energy and public awareness it deserves.

Sheila C. Meader, Auburn