[TheForge] question for Bruce F. the Chemist

[Jerry Smith]

Albin,

Stick a nail in an apple, put it in the frig for a
couple of days. Then take the nail out of the apple
and eat the apple. Your iron intake will go up, do
this weekly and you will never be anemic. My
grandmother told me this.

Jerry
--- Albin Drzewianowski <dski1045 at qis.net> wrote:

> Bruce,
> 
> I was demonstrating in the Historic Forge at the
> local Farm Musuem today.
> 
> Towards the end of the day, as my arm starts giving
> out, I look for any 
> excuse to talk instead of hammering.  So when
> someone asked about the slack 
> tub, I gave them the story about how in the "old
> days" people would come and 
> buy water from the slack tub for medicinal purposes.
>  I thought that was 
> just a scam by blacksmiths to make a little money on
> the side.  But one of 
> the guests asked whether the water in the tub would
> pick up an iron from 
> having all the hot steel quenched or cooled in the
> slack tub.  Also, small 
> pieces of hot steel that have been cut off are often
> just tossed into the 
> slack tub.
> 
> So the question is:   would quenching  or cooling
> hot steel  or the presence 
> of small pieces of steel in the bottom of the slack
> tub increase the iron 
> content of the water such that it would have some
> medical benefit as some 
> kind of tonic???   Today, we have extra iron as a
> supplement in lots of 
> things that we eat, but back in the "old days" they
> did not.
> 
> Inquiring minds want to know.
> Albin
> Westminster, MD 
> 
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