A motorcycle brand known for so many successes officially rode into the sunset.

Harley-Davidson released a press release detailing the final Buell to be built in East Troy, Wisconsin. The fateful day was October 30th, the model a Buell Lightning XB12Scg which marked the 136,923 motorcycles built in the company’s 26 years of operation.

While reporting its quarterly financial results last month, Harley-Davidson announced it was discontinuing the Buell line as part of its 'go-forward business strategy to drive growth through a single-minded focus on the unique strengths of the Harley-Davidson® brand.'

Buell was founded by ex-Harley-Davidson engineer Erik Buell. He came home when the company first partnered with Harley-Davidson in 1993, and became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Harley by 2003. A landmark was reached on November 17, 2006, when Buell announced that it had produced and shipped its 100,000th motorcycle.

Some close to Milwaukee's motorcycle scene say Erik Buell anticipated Harley-Davidson's surprising decision. In a recent interview Erik expressed concerns over Buell Motorcycle's future.

"Especially in this economy, I do worry about it," he told Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's Rick Barrett in September 2009, "Who knows if the brand will survive? But if the philosophy of what we have done survives, then the brand could be absorbed and called Harley-Davidson and it wouldn't matter."

And many now wonder if the writing was on the wall when Harley-Davidson's then new President and Chief Executive Officer Keith Wandell, made his first cost-cutting decision and stop a planned consolidation of Buell's operations into one 163,000-square-foot factory in East Troy, Wisconsin.

Buell motorcycles will continue to be sold through existing dealers until inventory is depleted.