On Thursday, Aquablue's logo was emblazoned on a banner hung across the building, but "Hershey" could still be read on a rusting cylindrical tank outside. (Jeff Semple/CBC)

Hershey auctioned off tens of millions of dollars of chocolate-making equipment from its former eastern Ontario plant Thursday.

"It's the end of an era, it's the end of an era," said Bud Fawcett, who worked for 33 years at the plant in Smiths Falls, Ont., a town that once called itself the "chocolate capital" of Canada. His wife and two daughters once worked at Hershey too.

Prospective buyers had a chance to bid on about 1,400 items including a lollipop assembly line, a candy sugar-coating machine and a chipits chocolate chip machine, as well as more ordinary industrial equipment such as forklifts and case packers.

Fawcett didn't go to the auction, saying he didn't want to see the machinery up for sale.

"Because it brings back memories of a lot of money spent, a lot of work spent and a good time."

Hershey announced in February 2007 that the plant would start shutting down later that year.

The announcement was a huge blow to the town, which still holds an annual chocolate and railway festival annually. The factory employed 400 people in the town of 9,000 and the adjoining Chocolate Shoppe drew hundreds of thousands of visitors each year.

Smiths Falls Mayor Dennis Staples announced in May that Aquablue International, a Canadian water-bottling company, was close to finalizing its purchase of the former Hershey plant.

On Thursday, Aquablue's logo was emblazoned on a banner suspended across the building, but "Hershey" could still be read on a rusting cylindrical tank outside.

'Everything's gone from in there'

"It's a shame to see it go," said Rick Millson, who drove in from the Wasaga Beach area for the auction. "But their loss could be our gain."

Millson is with the Canadian Renaissance Festival, a medieval-themed event that wants to set up in Mississippi Mills or possibly Smiths Falls. He flipped through the list of items up for auction, pointing out that many of the items aren't available anywhere else.

"There's even a small lollypop manufacturing thing in there," he said, suggesting that could be handy for his festival, which was willing to spend $10,000 at the auction. "Even though it's a 16^th-century production, it still has to be modern-day equipment to run everything – you know, so cables, refrigeration units."

Local resident Lawrence Barber came by with his daughter, now a young woman. She had loved visiting the plant since she was three years old, he said.

"Everything's gone from in there," Barber reported. "It's so different."

Fawcett said the whole town feels the loss of the plant.

"They were a real tourist attraction ... the tour bus operators, the restaurants in town, all these people are affected by that."

But he said the new water-bottling plant might provide future opportunities.

"The closure is closed now. We're Aquablue now."