In 2011, Republican Ed Lewis was elected as Massillon's new Ward 6 member of council.
Lewis took about 54% of the vote in knocking out incumbent Dave McCune.
The biggest surprise wasn't that Lewis won, but that he didn't win with a larger share of the vote.
You see, Councilman McCune stopped going to the meetings.
And didn't much campaign for re-election.
On Massillon Review Throwback Thursday, we take a look at the attendance issues of Ed Lewis' predecessor on city council.
Absent
Within weeks of being elected to his first political office, Ed Lewis decided it was time to move onwards and upwards.
Word was spreading quickly around town that Lewis had his eyes on the mayor's office.
Ed Lewis was a man on the rise.
But before moving on up, Lewis had to defend his Ward 6 council seat.
In 2013, he faces re-election against Democrat Linda Litman, a bank executive with FirstMerit.
Lewis takes a closer than expected shave from Litman and hangs on by the skin of his teeth.
Switch 12 votes, and Litman would have been elected, and Lewis' burgeoning political career would have come to an end.
Last year, Ed Lewis once more contemplated running for mayor.
Word is, he hosted a number of campaign fundraisers to test the waters, but just didn't get the support he needed to take on incumbent mayor Kathy Catazaro-Perry.
So he would need to run for re-election to council this year.
But Democrat Linda Litman was coming back to take another shot at Lewis' Ward 6 seat.
And Lewis didn't think he could hold her off this time.
And, as an aspiring future leader of the City of Champions, he needed to expand his profile, and increase his name recognition across the whole city.
He wanted to run for a city wide office.
Unfortunately for our aspiring leader, there weren't any open city wide opportunities.
Running and being elected for council at large would certainly raise his profile, but Massillon already had 3 strong incumbent council members serving at large; Milan Chovin, Michelle Del Rio Keller, and Paul Manson.
And it was extremely unlikely he would dislodge any of them from their city wide offices.
Ed Lewis' political future hung in the balance. What would our future mayor do?
Would Massillon forever be deprived of his future leadership?
What would he do?
Run for council at large, where he would probably lose, or run for re-election to his Ward 6 seat, where he almost lost last time.
Lewis needed help, or the embers of his his budding political career would surely be extinguished.
He needed someone to take it on the chin for the team.
And fortunately for Ed Lewis, he found someone to sacrifice themselves for the greater good.
