I was pondering the other night about what people generally do for a living who are involved with this art. So what does everyone here do? Are there any orthodontists out there who are leading double lives as blacksmiths? Or are we all involved in some sort of metal working field?

I work for the New Mexico Game and Fish as a Fish Biologist.

I sell agricultural repair tools. I also assist in design and fabrication. It lets me travel to ag shows all over the U.S.and Canada.

I am a software engineer working for a major computer manufacturer. I live in New Mexico near El Paso TX and work at the factory in Mexico.  Previous to this job I worked as an software integration engineer for the National Radio Astronomy Observatory at the VLA headquarters building in Socorro NM working on the ALMA project being built in Chile. After a long day of working with computers it is very therapeutic to come home and hit metal with a hammer---repeatedly!  I have  BS's in Geology/Geophysics and Computer and Information Science and used to work in the oil patch in the early 1980's

Welcome Emower,

I forge ornamental and architectural iron, weld snow plows (smh), repair /fabricate factory and manufacturing equipment. 

Most blacksmithing communities seem to have at least one doctor, dentist, 8+ years of college smith.

Some even know how to forge . 

Does your local office have an in-house fabrication shop or do you farm it out? I'm trying to sniff out your local scrap pile. 

 

 

 

I'm an Auto Body collision repair tech. I forge and do scrap sculpture by night. I'm working at doing my hobby full time but that will take some time.

I'm a manufacturing engineer for a lifesaving equipment manufacturer (Lifejackets and Liferafts). 

About 28 years in Aerospace, the last 13 of which have been as a tool and cutter grinder/engineerig support; wedge in there somewhere about two years of aimless wandering.

Last 22 months with a team making Rolls Royce jet engine components.

Beat steel to decompress from the unnerving necessity of high stress zero error throughput.

Robert Taylor

I am an electronics repair technician. I repair industrial  high speed color printers,and color copiers . I beat on metal for fun .

Well... I'm sixteen and worked last year and plan to work this year at a strawberry type farm and have helped a guy bale hay.  Now starting to think about colleges as I want to do some type of engineering in the future.

20 years industrial machinist, maintenance. Made colonial reproduction ironwork for 13 years for someone else. I've worked for myself, selling my own forged products for almost 17 years. Haven't missed any meals yet!

Blacksmith.

Make fences hand rails gates and other metal items forging, welding and machining.

I work as an IT technician.

I work for a major premium cable channel in the design and advertising department. I help come up with the concepts to sell our shows. 

 Taxidermist....recently retired.

this is very interesting. i really like this forum. i have been everything that a little boy growing up on 1940's and 50's tv wanted to be: started out on family dairy farm, went to navy, saw half  the world, became a cowboy after that, both dude ranch and working ranch type. learned how to shoe horses and made a decent living on that till back gave out, became a firefighter, emt, policeman. then got into railroading, basically was an APE, (all purpose employee), engineer, conductor forklift operator, also worked on steam engines. after retiring about 10 years ago got called back to part time railroad again this past summer and going  back in the spring. 

Worked general labor construction to put myself through college for computer programming, and realised I didn't want to be in a box the rest of my life (plenty of time for that after) So to my fathers dismay, after college I stayed in the construction field and got licensed as an Electrician, and stayed there for over 30 years.  I've ran a martial arts school, and even worked personal security for a while and been a part time smith for 25 years so far, and during this time managed to write a book on knife making. I have no idea what the next 10 to 15 years has in store for me.

I started my professional life as a woodworker, doing semi-custom furnituremaking. I've also worked in violin repair, art restoration, and furniture sales. For the last thirteen years, I've been a professional fundraiser, currently doing major gift work for a small liberal arts college in Ohio. I have a degree in Ancient Greek Language and Literature, and smith purely as a hobby.

I worked as a telecommunication engineer in primarily radio systems for companies such as Motorola, Rockwell, Boeing, Cisco and Lockheed.  During those times my primary hobby was woodworking and gunsmithing as I also love to hunt.  Two years ago I retired from the IT world but still do the gun work  and now find blacksmithing as a hobby  a great joy.

well i'ma minor and don't have a ''real'' job, but i am apprenticing as a farrier and hope to pursue this as a career. for the time being i do odd jobs, fencing, and handyman/construction work for friends and friends' friends, as well as making a bit off of smithin every once in a while. 

I paint in an auto body shop. I took an unfortunate fall off of a ladder while painting a pickups roof that required rotator cuff surgery. So im on vacation now for the next 6 weeks

15 hours ago, Emower said:

Any orthodontists out there who are leading double lives as blacksmiths?

I do know an orthodontist who has done some blacksmithing.

I've been in horticulture the last 36 years, the last 24 as a self employed design-install landscape contractor.  No metalwork in my background until 6 years ago.

Steve

I spend about half my time (depends on the season and flow of projects) as a professional architectural metalworker, try to push the design teams toward forged work but I'm quite familiar with my welder.  The remaining time I build custom timber frames and when needed will project manage construction jobs or even put on a tool belt and bang out some carpentry.  Whatever pays the mortgage, each of the above compliments the skill set of the others.  

BS in Industrial Design and Technology from a state college in New Hampshire.  In retrospect it was more of a machine and manufacturing degree with an unfortunate (for me) minor in biz management.  

22 hours ago, Emower said:

 Are there any orthodontists out there who are leading double lives as blacksmiths? 

Don't know any orthodontists but know a retired orthopedic surgeon who is a pretty good blacksmith.

11 hours ago, mutant said:

I work for a major premium cable channel in the design and advertising department. I help come up with the concepts to sell our shows. 

Does this mean I get to give you crap about all those insultingly stupid commercials? 

I grew up in Dad's metal spinning and machine shop, probably would've continued working there but he got successful enough for OSHA to take notice and oh NO I couldn't even walk into the shop area. Studied metal working in school up to trade schools to certify as a welder fabricator. Welding and fabrication turned into a great fall back and auxiliary skills sets to operator jobs. The more you can do the less likely you'll be out of work.

Anyway, after seeing my welding instructors raft of health problems as a direct result of welding I decided it'd be a good fall back. Did whatever for whoever would hire me for a few years till landing an operator's job with the state Of AK and put in 30 years. Retired and got another operator's job with a rental outfit 10 minutes from home till the Birch clocked me out of the job market. 

Been a hobbyist blacksmith since I was old enough to hide the fires well enough the folks wouldn't notice. Dad thought I should learn a paying trade instead so I had to keep it on the down low.

Frosty The Lucky.

I'm currently an 11th grade English teacher and coach.  Got a degree in philosophy and the classics and promptly went into manufacturing, construction and then bar tending for a number of years.  I learned blacksmithing years ago at a friend's farm and fell in love with it.  Finally got the equipment and started blacksmithing last year on my own.