Is Blacksmithing still a dying trade?

[Everything Mac]

Hi guys, 

I was having a conversation with a buddy of mine about blacksmithing in general and how it is still a dying trade.

 

But that got me wondering - can it still be regarded as such? 

 

Ok it's never going to be up to the levels it was even 60 years ago but it does seem to be undergoing some what of a resurgence. 

Particularly in the UK thanks to a number of mainstream TV programmes bringing the craft to light - I've seen quite a lot of people wanting to give it a go. Granted these are all amateurs rather than professionals - nevertheless the craft seems to me to be very much alive.  

 

Any thoughts?

 

Andy

 

 

[jeremy k]

Check the number of members of many groups around the world - Dying.....NOT.... it's ALIVE!!!!!!

[Francis Trez Cole]

if it was dying would northern tools have a section of just blacksmithing tools http://www.northerntool.com/shop/tools/category_metal-fabrication+blacksmith-tools

 

there are more people looking to the old way of doing things from basket weaving to blacksmithing folk schools are doing great

[Steve Sells]

look as this site, over 27,000 members, and I bet there are others that have not found us yet plus those with out internet,  so some one is still interested

[Mitsuwa]

Well I can think of a number of blacksmith shops each of them being not more than 30 miles apart from the next,

and these are the professionals, never mind the hobbists, but I imagine it varies depending on region.

[SmoothBore]

Not dying, ... but very definately CHANGING.

 

Today, the interest, ... and therefore the money, ... is in "Art", ... rather than utilitarian objects.

 

**********************************************

 

Twenty five years ago, one of the first "comissions" I ever recieved, was for "S" shaped, tapered "Joint Strikers", ... for a Stone Mason, who could no longer buy them in that style, from any of the Masonry Supply Houses.

 

The design and making of that sort of "Speciality Tools", IS still dying out.

 

 

 

.

[GNJC]

I had a conversation about this with John B a few months ago and he made the point that - in the UK anyway - almost all work a blacksmith now does is a 'luxury', fabricators being able to make most things quicker and cheaper. On consideration, I think he was pretty much right. The trade is certainly not dying, far from it, but I guess that its size will rise and fall with the spending power of the middle clases.

[Everything Mac]

That's very true. I think you've hit the nail on the head really. Gone are the days when Smiths made everything. 

 

I had a conversation about this with John B a few months ago and he made the point that - in the UK anyway - almost all work a blacksmith now does is a 'luxury', fabricators being able to make most things quicker and cheaper. On consideration, I think he was pretty much right. The trade is certainly not dying, far from it, but I guess that its size will rise and fall with the spending power of the middle clases.

[David Einhorn]

There are at least eight blacksmith guilds within driving distance of less than three hours, and I am a member of three of them.  At least seven of those guilds/clubs have more than two hundred members with some having over 350 active members.   

[FieryFurnace]

There will always be a need for customized forged iron-work, in some form. 

[Pug}{maN]

This might sound weird to sum but the reason I started was because of the way the economy was I wanted to know how to be more self reliant . What'd to make my own tools and weapons. Fix things that possibly could not be bought anymore . I have always been a hunter but now I'm doing more black powder a bow and arrow.

My point being I think lots of people have the same ideas I had maybe that's why there was a jump in the interest of blacksmithing as of the last few years?

[yesteryearforge]

Im a Low tech man in a Hi-tec world

Ive noticed that in the majority of students that come thru the school are I T people

Its like they woke up one day and realized that there is something on the end of their arms and they can use those things to MAKE THINGS.

I attribute the surge almost soley to the internet and videos.

[Albert A Rasch]

Fellows,

 

there will always be a segment of the population that wants to do things "their" way. Folk and art schools always have some program or another that focuses on some archaic principle or trade. I read an article on Mukome Gane recently, which stated that there are more Mukome Gane artisans in the US alone today than in all of the history of Japanese craft society. So is Mukome a dying craft? Seems like it's growing gang busters! On the other hand, the days of the village blacksmith, shoeing horses, tireing a wheel, making a hinge, are, for the time being, gone. But don't even discount that idea. Who knows what this world has in store for us. All it will take is a small sustained dislocation of energy production or delivery, or some other calamity that we are ill prepared for, for the lot of us to be in high demand...

 

Stop and think of this. Drilling a hole. How many people do you know are capable of designing and executing the equivalent of a Cole drill? If you don't know what a Cole drill is, all I would have to do is describe it to you and you could make a serviceable one without too much difficulty. But you take your average layman and he would be hard pressed to even figure out how to bend a piece of metal, much less attach it to another with nothing more than fire, brain, and brawn!

 

Metamorphic.

 

That's what blacksmithing is.

From one incarnation it transforms itself into another.

 

Best regards,

Albert

[thingmaker3]

Depends on how one defines "blacksmithing." If one defines it as "changing the shape of hot steel into intentional and useful form" then "dying" is the diagnosis of a quack. "Dying" crafts don't sink $3.3 million into individual power hammers. "Dying" crafts don't use state-of-the-art simulators to tweak their details. "Dying" crafts don't use tongs manipulated by forklifts.

 

http://www.forgemag.com/

 

"Dying" is quite different indeed  from "evolving beyond the wildest dreasm of those who practiced the craft in ages past."

 

Of course, if one wants to define "blacksmithing" as "what nobodybut me does anymore" then all bets are off.

[Pug}{maN]

You're right I guess the question should have been is traditional blacksmithing dying?

[Albert A Rasch]

Pugh,

 

Then the answer is most certainly no. There are a ton of guys out there doing "smithing" with nothing more than a hunk of steel, visegrips, a and couple of sledges and ballpeen hammers, with forges made out of washtubs and clay dug out of a river bank,

 

and making a living dong it!

 

If we break it down though, and I do not have the answer to this, on a per capita basis, there might be fewer smiths now than there were 100 maybe even 50 years ago, but in absolute numbers, there have got to be more than ever if Youtube is any indication! Or if you look at the number of suburban farriers, their numbers are astronomical. I'm beginning to think that well heeled "hobby" smiths who build up well equipped "traditional" shops might outnumber traditional smiths of yesteryear!

 

Interesting speculation; I'm going to keep my eyes open and see what is out there.

 

 

Best regards,

Albert

[Francis Trez Cole]

in uncerton times people like to have something to hold on to. As a person once said to me at a cocktail party I heard you blacksmith. Yes I do. So you are going to be the hardware store if all this falls apart. More and more people want to hold on to things they like so when they break they look for someone to fix them. That is what the village blacksmith has always been doing.

[Ridgewayforge]

There is currently and will always be, I predict, a want for things hand made and made in America (at least in the United States, I should clarify). I know my dad and other members of my family turn to me when they need a tool or a nice gift for someone. There will be a place for it. As long as one person keeps in alive, it will remain.

[JackofTrades]

For me personally, it was a underlying life long ambition.  Perhaps just starting to be realized but never the less there.  I don't see it dying anytime soon... least of all when the passion is passed on.

[Frank Turley]

Living History.

 

I began horseshoeing with a forge in 1963, BC (before computers). I soon became interested in forging things other than horseshoes and pritchels. So, fifty years ago, there were two farrier's associations: Illinois and Southern California. There was no overall blacksmiths' association, although I think blacksmiths were included in the structural and bridge builders' union.  I attempted to find and locate working smithies and found only one within 200 miles of me; I was in Salem, Oregon, at the time. The one man I found was a dresser of boo coo plow shares every Spring and as a welder, he made horse trailers. I found three or four other shops that looked to be smithies. The anvil was present, but the forges were "retired" or gone. The shops were either welding shops or had been changed into auto repair garages. Face it; blacksmithery was moribund.

 

Alex Bealer's book came out in 1969 and my school opened in 1970. I was unaware of any other blacksmithing activity until I started teaching. I didn't know a great deal, but I knew "more than the average bear." To get the word out, I listed my school in Stewart Brand's "The Whole Earth Catalog." In 1971, Tom Bredlow of Tucson, popped into the shop. He was an age mate and well into the craft, so we had a good visit. What else was going on in the U.S.? Little by little, I found out about other regionally well known smiths: Francis Whitaker in Colorado; Donald Streeter in New Jersey; Philip Simmons in South Carolina; Carl Jennings in California; Albert Paley in New York; and Brent Kington in Illinois.

 

ABANA started in Georgia in '73, and many of us budding and experienced smiths were able to meet each other during the U.S.A bicentennial year, 1976, at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale. This Carbondale ABANA conference was an exciting time for us, because we knew we were on the cusp of a revival.

 

P.S. The American Farriers Association was founded in Albuquerque in 1971,

[VaughnT]

I would dearly love to see blacksmithing guild like the knife-maker's have wherein a smith is judged upon his ability.  A journeyman smith is a far different thing than a master, and I think there are countless minions that call themselves blacksmiths simply because they hammer on hot iron.

 

Can you weld two pieces in the fire? Can you build a gate or fence like we see built in the Victorian era?  Can you make a rose?

 

What is it that makes you a "blacksmith"?  What skills do you possess?

[yesteryearforge]

Peeled back to the Basic definition

If you smite the Black Metal  you are a BLACKSMITH

[Chuck in Ms]

Wow, what a topic. I want to jump in here somewhere but started trying to quote everyone. Jack of Trades said it best for me. I have family roots in this trade and it is something I am driven to do.
Mr Rasch, I am the "hobby smith" you spoke of. My shop is completely traditional and I am currently replacing every store bought item with one of my own making. The fire pot will be the last to go.
Does this make me a blacksmith? I like to think yes. I have been doing demos for a few years now but tell the spectators that I am an apprentice blacksmith. Is that correct? I study the craft, attend conferences and hammer it's, visit other shops and blacksmiths whatever I can do to learn. So I think I can say I am an apprentice blacksmith. I take more commissioned work each year with very happy clients across state lines so does that make me a "real blacksmith"? Most importantly my two sons are in the early stages of learning this time honored craft with the oldest participating in demos some.
Now to tie this together, I have not done anything different than anyone else reading this. We are all blacksmiths, all learning and teaching. So Blacksmithing is not a dying trade. It is growing more each year.
Sorry about the rant but this is personal to me.
One disclaimer, my shop is traditional to my idea of traditional only.
Thanks Chuck

[John McPherson]

As a trade, very much dead. That whole world of animal powered agriculture related subsistence jobs is dead and gone in most of the civilized world. Oh, there are a still a few industrial tool makers like Stuart and such, but you could find a hundred easier ways to make a living than sharpening plows and making agricultural doodads.

 

Ah, but as an art form, whether ornamental ironwork, high end custom tools and sharp-n-pointies, or just folks making things for pleasure and amusement, it is still around and going gangbusters.

[John McPherson]

Dang, double post.