Hey, Have you heard....

When you have a hobby you suddenly become an expert to everyone you know on all things even remotely related to that hobby. It's a natural phenomenon. People interact with you, discover your hobby and, either out of genuine interest or mere politeness, they try to engage with you on that topic. Sometimes it's a bunch of questions on the origin of the hobby and how you came to be involved, or it's a story about a friend or relative who is also into that hobby. Sometimes they relate a time when they, themselves, dabbled in that hobby.

As a hobby blacksmith, there is a minimum of 5 common points of conversation that come up.

1. Ancestral blacksmithing, either mine, theirs or someone they know
2. Horseshoes
3. The Renaissance Faire
4. Civil War Re-enactment
5. Have I heard about the blacksmithing shows on The History Channel called "Forged in Fire" and "Milwaukee Blacksmith"?

These are all fine topics and talking about them is a pleasure. I appreciate, just like anyone else, someone taking an interest in me or the things I like to do.

When "Forged in Fire" came out, I heard a lot about it because it had the word "Forge" right in the title. I don’t subscribe to any cable or satellite service nor do I even have an antenna hooked up for broadcast television so I couldn’t watch the show on schedule. My TV viewing experience is limited primarily to my Bluray player for disks, Netflix or YouTube. It wasn’t until I discovered I could cast the programs on the TV via my smartphone using The History Channel App that I started watching these shows with some regularity. Most people know I carry a knife with me most of the time and have a small collection of them that I rotate through. People naturally thought a show about making knives and swords and axes and all kinds of other weapons would not only be a show I would love to watch but also, since it's a competition show, try to compete on.

They are partially correct.

I very much enjoy the show. It's style is identical to a competitive cooking show on The Food Network called "Chopped". Four smiths use their skills to complete a challenge in a set amount of time with one smith being eliminated after each round. The winner gets $10,000. It’s a wonderful show, the panel of judges are tough but fair and often act as cheerleaders for the people competing. There is a minimal amount of drama and the show mostly focuses on the craftsmanship of the smiths competing. You can see some truly wonderful work and if you're not too jaded, you might even get swept up in the action. I watch this show with my wonderful girlfriend Jessie and we both find ourselves gasping when something goes really wrong or oohing and ahhing when something goes really right. We look forward to watching whenever we can.

However, as much as I like watching this show, there is NO WAY I want anything to do with being on it. I don’t like working under that kind of pressure and I cannot stand having someone scrutinize and judge my work. When I’m working on stuff I like keeping my own pace and having the piece naturally come to fruition. I will happily remain a spectator.

Milwaukee Blacksmith is a whole other matter. That show appears to be closely modeled after “Orange County Choppers” where there is a family business and they have a crazy deadline or challenge to meet and or overcome and there are family arguments but in the end there is success. There is also an unnecessary recap after each commercial break taking away from overall content. The show has a much more scripted feel about it and some of the drama of the episode can induce a bit of eye-rolling.

That does not keep it from being a show I’m very fond of. Jessie and I have watched the episodes as they have become available and quite enjoy a good deal of the programming. The projects that come out of that shop are wonderful and seeing scenes from around Milwaukee and the surrounding area in a program like this is pretty cool. Earlier today we were at the Kenosha Harbor Market and afterwards stopped by the Dinosaur Museum to check out the T-Rex Statue they created in the most recent episode.

We have already planned on adventuring to see other projects on display. The show is also good for Milwaukee in that it promotes a city that has a long history in manufacturing. There are also some really beautiful shots of Milwaukee in the transition scenes. Providing the show doesn’t turn into the drama-filled screamfest that O.C.C. turned into, I expect we will be watching regularly. I may even look into taking their Blacksmithing 101 class offered on their website. Learning is an ongoing adventure.

2015 update and goals

Happy 2015 Friends!

I thought I’d update everyone on how things are going at Fox River Forge. We are moved into our final location! We have returned to Big Bend and now reside in a garage a short distance from where we first started. In truth, I had wanted to set up in this location all along but I needed to work out the details a little more than I had at the time. Since then I have been out there working on things, building skills and working out the layout of the shop. It still needs some work but it is functional and I feel a real connection with the building we’re in. I will put together a post dedicated to the new shop location. I expect there will be an accompanying video as well.

In this post I want to lay out some goals for 2015. I’m in a place where I believe I can personally dedicate more focus on the forge. I would like to establish some items I want to accomplish this year and then at the end of the year we can review and see how we did. So here are5 things I want to accomplish by December 2015.

1. Do an off-site blacksmithing demo for a public group. This will involve loading my gear, going somewhere, setting up a portable smithy and working with people who have had little if any experience with this craft.

2. Continue to create items at the home location that will eventually be available for purchase. I’d like to have a surplus of wall hooks, bottle openers, corkscrews and other items available to anyone interested in purchasing something like this.

3. Become confident in the task of forge-welding. I see this as an essential skill I will need in order to really grasp the fundamentals of this craft. I have made 3 successful welds so far. I would like to refine the quality and appearance of my welds.

4. I would like to start offering individual blacksmithing classes. These would be a 4 to 6 hour session with an overview of the blacksmithing trade and hands-on experience leading to the student crafting their own piece to take with them.

5. Possibly open an Etsy store. This will depend almost 100% on how goal #2 works out. I briefly looked into it recently and it was enough to confirm my guess that I am not at all ready for one right now.

So there it is, my 2015 goal for Fox River Forge. Here are some photos of items I have made in the past few months.

The Barski Bowie

For over a decade I have been supplying nightmare to anyone who was brave enough to check out The Haunted Woods hosted by The Bear Den Zoo in Waterford Wisconsin. I play a character named Hector Barski. Hector is a serial killer to traps his victims and proceeds to do all sorts of unspeakable things to them with all sorts of unspeakable tools. The most infamous one of all is a 12” long Bowie style knife he made out of some scrap steel he had around his farm. The Barski Bowie was designed to instill fear and remove body parts. It is sharp enough to do the job but not enough to make it quick and painless which is sort of the point. I was asked, by a fellow actor at the woods, to make a copy of Hectors knife. I agreed. Here is the result.