All good things must end.

For nearly four decades, The Forecaster has taken immense pride in being a weekly part of our communities’ heartbeat.

This week brings our final print edition and while the product will continue with electronic editions and digital newsletters, it truly is the end of an era.

Back in the fall of 1986, during the second Reagan administration, around the time a certain ground ball went through the legs of an unfortunate Bill Buckner, several volunteers created a weekly paper to address a news void in Falmouth.

From humble beginnings, as a twice-monthly product, The Forecaster, which would remain known to many as the Falmouth Forecaster even long after the paper branched out to Cumberland, Yarmouth, Freeport and beyond, quickly became a powerhouse in the local news field.

That rise truly began when Marian McCue bought the paper in 1990 and along with publisher Karen Rajotte (later Wood), one of the paper’s founders, they created a product that did more than just fill a news void, producing a paper that was eagerly anticipated and highly respected.

The Forecaster became a weekly in 1992. Then, after expanding into Cape Elizabeth, Scarborough and South Portland in 2001, a move which allowed yours truly to come on board as the full-time sports editor, The Forecaster’s portfolio drew the interest of the Lewiston Sun Journal, who purchased us in 2003.

Almost immediately, a Portland edition was introduced (for my money, the best move we ever made) and the growth continued two years later with the introduction of a Midcoast edition.

Through it all, we broke stories, drew in readers with our always-popular, occasionally controversial Police Beat, and hired hungry, promising young reporters, many of whom went on to write for larger papers not just in Maine but as far away as Alaska.

Even after the industry was hard hit by the loss of subscribers and increasing print costs, The Forecaster retained its value and was purchased by MaineToday Media, parent company of the Portland Press Herald, in 2017.

Recent events didn’t come as a surprise.

Our papers had dwindled from 32, 36, even 48 pages in our heyday to a mere eight or 12 in recent months, but the decision to end the print editions was jarring, nonetheless.

The Forecaster wasn’t just a newspaper. It was a family.

Marian, now a member of the Maine Press Hall of Fame, showed incredible generosity to her employees. Karen was always quick with a hug or a word of encouragement and our longtime editor, Mo Mehlsak, despite his overt New York Yankee fandom, was beloved by those whom he mentored. Staff meetings weren’t complete unless there was good-natured ribbing and lots of laughter.

I first walked into The Forecaster’s building on Foreside Road in Falmouth in 1999, got hired to produce a couple of freelance sports stories per week and it mushroomed from there into a full-time gig, but it was more than a job. It was truly a labor of love. The great joy of my life.

If someone had told me a quarter-century ago that I would get to be a paid sports writer for 25 minutes, I’d have taken it in a heartbeat. Getting to be one for 25 years makes me feel like the most fortunate man alive.

And with that in mind, the final thought is one of gratitude, not sadness.

Thank you to our many advertisers, to Marian, Karen, Mo and all the employees who lived and breathed local news and for nearly four decades, made The Forecaster a can’t-miss product.

Most of all, thank you to our loyal readers who picked up our paper week after week.

We never could have done it without you.

Thank you.