[TheForge] anvil pointing

Thu Jul 24 14:47:00 2003

A farrier was in my shop and said I must be left handed  on account of the
way the anvil was pointed, that comment didn't mean a thing to me.  I have
100 # and a 155#  peter wright anvils , they move all around the shop
sometimes they are off the block and on the floor, just depends what I'm
doing and what feels comfortable at the time.
----- Original Message -----
From: "George Dixon" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Thursday, July 24, 2003 9:08 AM
Subject: [TheForge] anvil pointing


> I can recall playing around with which way the horn worked best, left or
> right, with my first anvil.
> When I got to Samuel Yellin's shop some years later, I was pointing the
> horn to the right....I'm right handed so perhaps that was why.
> Every anvil in the shop was pointed to the left.   I turned the one I
> was to use to the right....force of habit.  The shop forman, the son of
> a blacksmith but a machinist by training, asked "why in the #%$@!" I was
> doing that.....
>
> Maybe a year later, a very old man came to visit the shop.  He had
> worked for Yellin in the 1920's.  He toured the shop and then paused. He
> noted one anvil was pointing to the right.  "At least one anvil is set
> correct" says he.   So I talked to him about what he meant.
>
> He stated, in a manner that made clear that he thought everyone knew
> this......., that industrial blacksmiths set their heel to the right and
> ornamental blacksmiths set their horn to the right.  Industrial smiths
> use more hardy tools and punch more holes (pritchel means punch,
> basically) while ornamental smiths use the horn more for curves and such.
>
> It is interesting to note that he had worked there when only ornamental
> work was done, so accordingly each anvil horn pointed right.  The Yellin
> shop shifted from ornamental to industrial work during WW2, ornamental
> did not come back until the brief period from the 1980's to 1992 when
> the shop was closed.  So, by his reckoning, the anvils were reset during
> the war and the break in continuity in blacksmithing had left them that
way.
>
> It seems like there is a lot of what was the tradition in our past that
> may have been forgotten except for an occasional echo.
>
> George Dixon
> (it no doubt matters more that one knows the step on an anvil is not for
> cutting, than which way the horn is heading)
>
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