The Times reports that the Holland Bar will reopen as soon as this Wednesday under the faithful stewardship of Gary Kelly, a salesman for Time Warner Security and the owner since 1998. It turns out, Kelly’s landlord pushed him out in hopes of selling the building — when that didn’t pan out, he rented the space back to him with a 20 percent rent increase. Here’s the bad news: “Much of the physical record of the bar’s history that had been pasted to its walls — the photographs of customers who had died years before, the posters for shows at the dear, departed CBGB — is gone, too. Mr. Kelly sent many framed pictures home with regulars as farewell gifts, other memorabilia went into storage. One of the relics of the Holland’s lore — an urn containing the ashes of Charlie O’Connor, a former bartender — had gone missing.” The original sign, however, is still around, and Kelly is hopeful his regulars will come back for $4 beers.
