[TheForge] Blacksmiths in space!

[Bruce]

Frosty et al.,
I am fortunate to have run into only one seriously common-sense-deprived
fellow at our open forge meet.  It was while I was still assembling the
first version of the Grasshopper Hammer.  The frame was assembled and I was
installing the arms -- the first moving members.  I was squatting near the
treadle hooking up something or other and was expecting the arms to move --
but they didn't.  Turned out that this doofus "was helping" -- by holding
the arms where they could swing into me and brain me.  (Sorry -- I forget
the details.)  I never again worked when he was in the shop.  I couldn't
risk it.

The worst I normally see is poor hammer technique, which is fairly easy to
correct.  We do have a couple die-hards who insist on using 5-lb hammers
for everything.  We warn them but they don't listen.  One of these is a
carpenter, so maybe he'll be okay.  Not sure about the other, but he hasn't
shown up recently.  (I wonder why.)

OTOH, recently we had a newbie in his 50's show up and he picked up the art
faster than anyone else I've ever seen.  Turns out he's been swinging a
hammer for years -- repairing auto bodies.   The application is different,
but his hammer skills were phenomenal -- better than mine, for sure.

I refuse to use Facebook for reasons that should be obvious to everybody by
now -- but somehow aren't, or are but are ignored anyway.  So some folks in
our group decided we should have a Facebook page, which naturally pulled
attention from our web page (sigh).  I just learned that the fellow who,
most recently, has been monitoring this page *hasn't been telling people
about our weekly open forge meet!*  So here we are with 300+ Facebook
"followers" and he's referred none of them to our primary activity!  If
only 2%-3% of those are in or near NJ, that would be 6-9 potential
members.  We politely straightened him out on that subject at our latest
Board meeting.

However, our website (which needs TLC at this point) ranks about #3 in a
Google search like "Blacksmith NJ", whereas our Facebook page ranks #1 --
which I consider a problem.  But the fad will play out...

One of our regular events is an open forge meet at Princeton University --
for the students -- which we've been doing now for many years.  It's very
popular, so popular that there isn't much time to teach.  I try to drag
people in who are reluctant by telling them something like, "Just get the
steel hot and hit it hard -- deform it.  If you don't make anything but
hammered steel, you've still learned something."  We do get some who really
want to make something elaborate and have to rain on their parade, but we
remind them that our open forge meet is only a 45 minute drive from
Princeton.

Bruce
NJ


On Tue, Jan 17, 2023 at 12:42 PM Jerry Frost <akfrosty at mtaonline.net> wrote:

> Seeing something from theforge list in my inbox makes me feel good too. Too
> many folks have gone to Facebook and it's nonsense babble.
>
> Since Forged in Fire our club meetings have started getting dangerously
> crowded, I spend as much time keeping people from getting hurt or hurting
> others than I do mentoring. The common condition I see at meetings is
> people
> with zero shop skills. Seriously adults who have never swung a hammer or
> used a power tool, let alone with people standing within a few feet.
>
> We have one member in his 50s who has zero sense in a shop, he's a great
> guy
> but should stay on the sidelines watching his son.
>
> Frosty, Meadow Lakes, Ak.
>
>
>
>