Glen Ross Hudgens, owner of downtown Bangor antiques shop Antique Alley, died at age 55 on Sunday after a weeks-long battle with COVID-19.
Hudgens’ death comes just a few weeks after his mother, Linda Newton, and stepfather, Charles “Dennis” Newton, both of Brewer, also died from COVID-19.
All three contracted COVID-19 in December, and were hospitalized. Dennis Newton died on Jan. 1 at age 72, and Linda Newton died on Jan. 19 at age 71, according to published obituaries and a GoFundMe page set up by Hudgens’ daughter, Miranda.
Glen Hudgens moved to Maine from his home state of California in 1988 with his wife, Millinocket native Renee. In 1997, they opened upscale furniture store Chez Renee in Bangor, which they ran for 10 years. Renee went into real estate after the store closed, and Glen became a mortgage lender.
Hudgens had been a collector and avid antiques lover since he was a child, according to a 2019 Bangor Daily News article. He collected tens of thousands of items from “picking” — visiting people with homes, garages and barns packed with stuff, picking through it, and selecting and purchasing the items with value.
Eventually, he turned his passion into a retail shop, opening Antique Alley on Columbia Street in downtown Bangor in July 2019. Since then, the shop has expanded to a second floor, and has launched a popular TikTok page with nearly 16,000 followers.
Betsy Lundy, executive director of the Downtown Bangor Partnership, who received confirmation of Hudgens’ death from his family, said he was the epitome of a downtown business owner, and saw him nearly every work day during the warmer months.
“Almost every day when the weather was even remotely tolerable I would find him standing on the corner of Water and Columbia streets, outside the open door to his store, greeting passersby and engaging in neighborly conversation on just about any topic under the sun,” she said. “We will all miss his friendly face and genuine warmth.”
In 2002, Hudgens’ mother, Linda Newton, and her husband Dennis Newton, joined Glen and his family in the Bangor area, settling in Brewer. There, the couple started a catering business called Las Dos Hermanas, sharing the traditional Hispanic dishes that Linda grew up with. They were longtime vendors each Saturday at Bangor’s European Market on Buck Street, serving up delicacies like tamales, red rice and empanadas.
“We miss them terribly,” said Ingrid Perkins, who has operated the market with her husband, Rick, for years. “It breaks our hearts to go into the greenhouse on Saturday mornings, and they aren’t there anymore. They were always smiling and playing lively music. They were such a happy couple.”
The Hudgens have two daughters, Kortnie and Miranda, and Hudgens and the Newtons are also survived by Hudgens’ siblings, Alex, Joginna, Linda and Todd, as well as many sons- and daughters-in-law, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.