FARMINGTON – Early morning at one of the town’s most noted landmarks, the Farmington Diner, gives patrons some good food, good conversation and in some cases, the transaction of a business deal or two.

But the end for this small Intervale restaurant is looming. Rite-Aid plans to build a larger pharmacy on the site that’s home to the diner, CN Brown and an empty building between them.

Most Tuesday morning diner patrons were not happy with the prospect but realistic about the future.

“People hate to change but it’s going to change,” said Allen Smith of Farmington, who was enjoying a cup of coffee and talk with friends, daily conversation mostly about the Red Sox, he said.

The diner’s history goes back to at least the 1950s, remembered Jerry Barker of Temple. Hubert Stewart ran a small business at the site and sold hamburgers and cheeseburgers there, he said.

“We could come in Friday night after a movie and have a cheeseburger, fries and a soda and still get change back from a dollar,” Barker said.

Then in the early 1960s the metal diner building was moved in. “I can remember it coming across the bridge,” said Peter Pillsbury. “It was the Lewiston Diner but was moved here and became Stewart’s Diner.”

Pillsbury sat with Allen Trask and Melvin Bard, who all agreed about the diner’s loss would be “terrible. We’ll probably go through withdrawal,” said one with others nodding. They said they usually come to the diner at different times. Most, Pillsbury said, are retired.

For Mary and Alvin Harris of New Sharon, the diner is a good place for breakfast after a trip to the gym, they said, and it’s a good way to meet people and see old friends. Faithful to her hometown pharmacy, she said, she was not a Rite-Aid customer, a comment frequently heard from others there Tuesday morning.

As the Harrises joke with their waitress, Trish Stevens, they voiced a hope that someone would move the diner to another location.

In April, when Rite-Aid’s intentions were announced, Brian Wood said that neither he nor his brother, Russell, owner of the property, have any plans to move the diner to another site. It would be costly and where would they move it, he asked.

“I hate to see it go. Everybody I know comes in here,” Barker said. “Where you going to go to find the people you know? I think Rite-Aid is fine right where it is. The smaller stores are being pushed out by the larger ones.”

That sentiment was echoed by Stewart Goodwin: “The old, traditional kind of place leaves for another chain drugstore. Times change, the town is not what it used to be.”

Coffee and eggs may be the staples of a breakfast special but the diner, especially between 5 and 7 a.m., is where a lot goes on besides breakfast, waitress Stevens said.

Robert Bean remembered a day when he brought his daughters in for the early-bird special. Working then as a financial advisor, he said, while there he took a stock order, gave another some financial advice, talked with Charles Webster about his furnace, ordered some gravel and spoke with a real estate agent, all before breakfast was over.

One positive opinion was voiced. “Traffic will probably improve with not so many turns,” said Allen Smith. Rite-Aid plans to eliminate the curb cuts across the space of the three businesses.

As Stevens quickly moved from one table to another, she took a moment to say that she hates to lose her job. She’s been working there for 13 years. “I’ll miss everyone,” she said.

Most of her customers shared that sentiment.