Do all blacksmiths look like blacksmiths?

[Rob Browne]

Dunno if I am a "normal" blacksmith but I wouldn't mind being a frog in some places. See earlier posts :)

[forgemaster]

I've been a smith for 28 years now 6 days a week at least (since I was 16 when I started as a 1st year apprentice) and when me and the good lady were married my mum told me that the priest looked more like a blacksmith than me, of course he had a thyroid problem and is dead now, where as I am still kicking. We have a tradesman working for us who we have dubbed "the fridge" cause he's as big as one. We have also had a little bloke working for us who was skinny and short, but he could carry a 3cwt anvil to his car. IMHO a blacksmith is anyone who has the skills be he or she fat skinny short tall muscular or wimpy, there is no stereotiypical blacksmith exept what the movies have conditioned the public to expect. Does that mean all highway cops look like something off CHIPS or all lawyers look like Ally McBeal, or all truckers look like BG McKay and his best friend Bear.

[Francis Trez Cole]

well 6'-2' 240 what is the typical look Edited July 10, 2009 by Francis Cole
trying to move photo

[thingmaker3]

We have one smith here in Portland who looks like Xena the Warrior Princess - except with lots of tattoos.

I look exactly like Orlando Bloom. Well, maybe not exactly.

[Svarttrost]

I thought I'll go and post a picture of meself

EDIT: Hope I got it right, being first timer

[thecelticforge]

I look like I have been hag ridden.

[short swing]

So you guys are telling me, the more I look like a blacksmith. The Better I will become? Most likely im at the shorter end of the blacksmith spectrum... 5' 4" 130?

[Brasilikilt]

Here's who I think is the most adorable blacksmith ever

Unfortunately I had to bribe her with a Popsicle in order to pose for this picture, but I think it's well worth it.

If nothing else, I hope that the things I teach her will cause any potential boyfriends to think twice about being less than ungentlemanly towards her in the future :-)

[matt87]

We have one smith here in Portland who looks like Xena the Warrior Princess - except with lots of tattoos.

Does she have a phone number?

With the beard I suppose I look somewhat blacksmithish but the skinniness kinda ruins the effect, as does watching me try to forge anything :D

[thingmaker3]

Does she have a phone number?

Yes. It's on the website for the forge she and her husband run. He looks a little like Hulk Hogan.

[Brasilikilt]

Thingmaker

Are you talking about that rather large Viking fellow in Oak Grove?

[thingmaker3]

Yes. Dan and Heidi of White Hart Forge. In addition to looking like a blacksmith, Dan is a good teacher and a fine craftsman.

[Panzom]

I'm 6'1" 320 lb. with a full beard. Odd this topic is being talked about because this weekend I was at a wedding and seen some old friends I have not seen in years. I was talking to one of them about what each other has been doing and I said that I have picked up blacksmithing as a hobby and he said "well doesn

[danielsmith]

just remember, there is a reason blacksmiths always appear on the cover of those romance novels.

[sawyer04]

Yeah most of us have similiar traits, I'm about 6-2, 250lbs, yet when dealing with kids, if you get down to their level, they don't seem to be too intimidated.

I was thinking you ask a kid and you will be told if a person is a smithy. Seems they know and at least the ones I know, not the least bit intimidated by noise and coal dust. I am really just a farmer, but always have a trinket made of scrap for the little ones.

[Bully]

Have had a good laugh reading this post and saw some mighty intresting pictures of Blacksmiths so I thought I would post a pic or 2 of me . The thumbs up reperesents a good day in the forge everything worked well for a change the other represents a not so good day and nothing worked....oh well as the saying goes look good do your job and if you cant do your job look good (or at least try) cheers.

[Vinlander]

Big scruffy hillbilly city slicker who needs a shower and smells of burnt coal. That's me.

But what makes a blacksmith a blacksmith? Is it a certain look? The ability to heat metal and forge it into something workable? I do shows and teach scouts with a portable ferrier forge I have. My youngest to make a horseshoe (albeit it a basic one from some 3/8 flat stock heated and bent around the horn and hammered flat) is 5 years old. Cute little blond girl with thick glasses who used a 10 oz hammer to do forge while I turned the work. Now she is a blacksmith too

Vinlander
yocw@yeoldecustomwood.com

[Joseff]

I was always told that this is what a blacksmith is supposed to look like.
Joseff

[Jorgensen]

A picture of me, forging at a local fair.

[Leland]

The first blacksmith I ever worked with was a farrier who, while enviously buff, was not an enormous man. Had he worn a suit, he might have been mistaken for an insurance salesman, professor, banker, or any of a number of other professionals.

As if looking good were not annoying enough, he had the disgusting trait of working in a gleaming white tee-shirt, which always started in the morning freshly-pressed (no, I'm not kidding -- there were creases!), then ended the day in exactly the same pristine condition. I, on the other hand, having endured the same work day but having done -- at best -- 1/3 the amount of work he did, wound up looking like a character Dickens might have dreamt up to populate one of his novels describing the horrible conditions of Industrial Age London...then discarded said character, as being too wretched to be believable!

Leland

[beth]

what a funny thread! well im a girl so presumeably i dont look like most of you - but i dont think its about build, beards etc ( as lovely as those things are obviously..) for me its all about the hands - i reckon you can always tell when someone can actually use their hands

[Avadon]

I think most people think that you gotta look like a blacksmith to be one. Which means you have to run a shop that is super old world, no power, dusty, sootie, all the traditional look, have a giant handle bar mustache or beard. lol

To me blacksmithing is just an extension of modern fabrication so everything in my shop is geared to be high tech and modern. I have no desire to give up power, tools, or abilities to "look the part". No mustache or beard here. hehe.. but I will say this when you know what your doing people will respect you as such regardless if you look like you do.

[Junksmith]

Good point Beth. I always get a little suspicious of a man with soft hands:o

Wen I meet a woman with firm hands, that tells me that she can appreciate the kind of work we do:cool:

[blafen]

Well I dont know I'm only about 6' 2" 240 and my right arm is only a few inches larger than my left, but then I again I havent had much forge time for quite a while. But I have seen all kinds of smiths, big smiths little smiths lady smiths and kid smiths so I think the only accurate way to determine a blacksmith is with a strong arm to weak arm ratio ie if strong arm = 1.5 weak arm diameters you oughtta be a smith.

[Panzom]

I did not grow the beard to look the part the beard was there years before I decided to become a blacksmith. Just like I wore glasses way before I became a computer nerd.