In June 2000, he arrived in Provincetown, Mass., on the ferry from Boston and started working in Lopes Square, a spot just off the piers frequented by tourists heading into town.

He entertained in front of the Ben & Jerry’s and other shops near the piers, joining guitar players, jugglers and other street performers in the artsy, nonconformist Cape town of about 3,500 residents.

At first, tourism officials welcomed Rlickman. Hotel owners let him come and drink beers at the end of the day. And soon he also entertained in front of Town Hall.

He never talked. He just kept whistling—the loud, piercing, annoying whistling that went on for hours. Kids flocked to his show, and he earned hundreds of dollars a day.

He never talked, that is, except when he had been drinking—and then he became “lewd” and “horrid,” according to Candice Collins-Boden, executive director of the Provincetown Chamber of Commerce.

“When Perri was sober, he was fine. When he was not, he was not. He was an embarrassment to the town,” she says. “While he was here, he was more drunk than sober. It was not a good image for our families.”

Complaints started coming into her office, which overlooks Lopes Square. She went outside to watch his performance and found him making sexually suggestive remarks to teenage girls. In a town with a large gay population that prides itself on its “No Place for Hate” initiative, he ridiculed gay couples as they walked by.

No one documented the incidents until Collins-Boden sent a letter to the chief of police, who revoked Rlickman’s street performing license before the next tourist season.

With his livelihood threatened, Rlickman contacted the ACLU.

“I’m not sure why, exactly, or how he knew about us,” says ACLU staff attorney Sarah Wunsch. “All sorts of people approach the ACLU.”

Wunsch wrote a letter to the police chief, arguing that freedom of speech mandated he reinstate the clown’s license.

“Offensiveness is not grounds for interfering with freedom of speech,” Wunsch says. “There was nothing about his expression that took it outside the First Amendment.”

Though authorities decided to reinstate the clown’s permit in June 2001, he left Provincetown for Harvard Square.

When he showed up at the Cambridge Arts Council to apply for his Square street performer’s license, Rlickman warned Cambridge officials that his act had gotten him into trouble before.

“People had said some rough things about not appreciating his style,” says Mary Ann Cicala, who oversees street performer permits. “I can definitely say that I think he went through a bit of culture shock in traveling from the southern states to the northern states.”