For much of his 28 years as mayor, a visit to Reed's dimly-lit City Hall office meant two things: Encountering a thick haze of cigarette smoke and being surrounded by a bevy of Civil War, Native American and Old West artifacts, which were crammed into both the mayor's conference room and his private quarters. Stung by the artifact backlash, as well as rising city deficits and service cuts related to runaway spending on the deeply indebted incinerator renovation, Reed would lose the Democratic primary to then-City Council President Linda Thompson. "That's one of many instances of poetic license taken by the attorney general's office in the drafting of the presentment," Hockeimer said. The $33.2 million project was split among the money Reed spent on literally thousands of Civil War artifacts, many of which remain stored away in the bowels of the museum, and state funds to build the place. A centerpiece of his economic development strategy had been a planned network of museums to draw tourists, including a Civil War museum that did get built. Under Thompson the city sold thousands of them, recovering about $4.4 million of the estimated $8.3 million the city paid for about 10,000 items. The Backlash Begins 
 
 Fred Clark, then a member of the Harrisburg Authority board that approved Reed's artifact spending, famously dubbed Reed as "the Walt Disney of our time in central Pennsylvania." They were purchased for museum projects and the city archives.
– Former Harrisburg Mayor Steve Reed was a man with a bold vision: Building one of the country's finest Wild West museums in Pennsylvania. But while the Democrat spent years searching the West for artifacts and brought about 10,000 of them back, the museum never got built and he now faces trial on more than 100 counts relating to what prosecutors say was his obsession, the AP reports. Reed, who was mayor for 28 years before losing a primary election in 2009, has been charged with 112 counts of receiving stolen property, as well as one count of evidence tampering and one count of dealing in the proceeds of unlawful activities. Hundreds of other charges, including theft, were thrown out last year because of the statute of limitations. Prosecutors say Reed, who successfully created the city's Civil War museum, used millions of dollars from the financially strapped city's bond issues to pay for artifacts like stagecoach equipment, Doc Holliday's dental chair, antique newspapers and guns, as well as a lot of forgeries, Reuters reports. He was known among dealers in the West for always paying top dollar and for sending an armed city cop to collect his many purchases, PennLive reported after he was charged in 2015. The city recovered about $4.4 million from selling thousands of the relics Reed bought, but some 1,800 other Old West artifacts were seized from his home and a warehouse he owns. The 67-year-old Reed's lawyers say he can prove he is the rightful owner of the seized items—and he wants them back.