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Editor:
Over the holiday, I had the pleasure of visiting Bye & Bye Hardware, a cornerstone business of Lisbon's historic downtown. Adding to the charm of the painted tin ceilings, swinging ladder shelves and helpful employees who have known my family for years were homemade cookie trays, punch and the smell of candles burning.
This quaint and cozy feeling can only be felt in these family-owned businesses in the village where I'm proud to have grown up.
But just a five-minute drive up Market Street will quickly dissolve your feelings of small-town charm. While a 200-year-old building, the former Taste of Country Restaurant, still stands, the history of this building is threatened by the construction of a Discount Drug Mart.
Further, businesses such as Bye & Bye Hardware, Morgan's Drug Store and Geronimo Supply, which have enhanced our community by preserving our historic buildings, established family-like connections with their customers and given back to our small community in service, are also threatened by this chain store.
Instead of working to preserve our small-town charm, we're welcoming a minimum wage paying business to Center Township. Tearing down this 200-year-old building only to replace it with this chain is disgraceful; once a historic building is torn down, it cannot be replaced. Unlike the stores and businesses of our downtown, it will do nothing to preserve the unique and valuable charm of Lisbon.
Regret is a one-way street. It makes me sad to say goodbye to such a potentially valuable piece of history only to say hello to an eyesore of a chain supermarket.
Pamela Pierce
Lisbon