The passage of a hometown bakery

I lamented the sad news this past weekend when my parents showed up from Michigan to my house in Columbus, empty-handed.
“Did you know Butler’s Bakery closed?” was their surprised greeting.
Butler’s Bakery was a locally-owned, Main Street, bakery located in Van Wert, Ohio, that sold a garden-variety of baked goods, but what we really loved were their egg noodles. First introduced to them at a Main Street training back in 2008, I chuckled when our host announced we would have the privilege of eating “life-changing” noodles with our chicken lunch. While I’ve never had “life-changing” anything before with a meal, these noodles *were* excellent and I made a note to ask about them.
Finding out they were made at Butler’s, and available for sale, I bought some the next time I was through Van Wert, and have stopped at least a couple times a year to pick some up each time I traveled to Van Wert, or was passing through to Michigan.
Unfortunately, as with so many things, Butler’s wouldn’t be here for forever, and there would come a day when I was passing through (or my parents were) and we’d find Butler’s closed.
Downtown Van Wert still has a lot of great amenities, not the least of which is their recently restored historic courthouse, but there’s one less downtown business providing its unique character to a unique downtown. And there’s one more former patron looking for a new source of life-changing noodles.