February 26, 2003
Forging new ideas out of old trade
More than 90 blacksmiths attend ninth annual Folly at the Forge in Traverse City
By Carol South
Herald contributing writer
With anvils and forges aplenty, blacksmiths this weekend at the Folly at the Forge learned techniques, swapped stories and pounded iron to their hearts' content.
More than 90 blacksmiths came to the ninth annual gathering hosted by local blacksmith Dan Nickels. For three days, Nickels - owner of Black Rock Forge in East Bay Township - opens his doors and welcomes blacksmiths from around the state and region, throwing a party in honor of the ancient trade.
"They don't have to bring anything except a willingness to learn," said Nickels, a carpenter who became a professional blacksmith eight years ago. "Everybody had a grand time."
From hobbyist to professional, the knowledge and excitement swirled about the room like the smoke from the forges.
Larry Ealy of Traverse City is a loyal attendee at the Follies and a dabbler in blacksmithing for ten years. He makes ornamental items such as custom fireplace doors on a forge at his house. Ealy also restores antique woodstoves.
"Every time I come out here I learn something," Ealy said. "A lot of people think that blacksmiths are a dying breed but just in the past ten years it has been picking up."
Ashen Carey of Ann Arbor represents the new generation of blacksmiths. Thirty years old, he has immersed himself in the trade for eight years and owns his own a blacksmith business downstate. Carey spent two years traveling in the Czech Republic, Italy and Israel to study with master blacksmiths, learning ancient techniques dating back a millennium.
"Prague is the seat of the blacksmith world, they never lost the culture," said Carey, during a pause in making some tools for a demonstration he was giving Saturday. "There are family-owned businesses there that date back 800 years. The hammers I use are based on a Czech design 1,000 years old."
Carey has a consuming passion for blacksmithing and views the years spent learning and traveling as part of his ongoing training. Because there are few formal training programs or apprenticeships, especially in the United States, absorbing information from master blacksmiths is key.
In this country, knowledge of blacksmithing skipped at least one generation. Europe and Israel continue to be repositories of knowledge where blacksmiths can work with the best of the best.
"It takes four to five years before someone starts getting the hang of it and typically 20 years before you become a master," said Carey, noting that one of the best blacksmith schools in the world - a high school - is outside of Prague.
Pat Hayes is a professional blacksmith who began as a farrier shoeing horses. Hayes makes ornamental and functional items at his Spirit Stone Forge in Kalkaska and attends the Folly at the Forge gatherings every year to help teach and share his experience.
"I'm one of the lucky ones because I get to do it all the time," Hayes said. "I'll hammer more in a day than most guys do in two months."
Despite his years in the trade, Hayes said he is still learning. Often it is the metal that gives him the best lessons, a fascinating process that keeps his work fresh.
"Sometimes the metal has to be coaxed, you have to coax the piece out of it," said Hayes, one of the founding members of the Folly at the Forge gathering. "Every day is different, every day is new."
A consummate host, Nickels always puts on a good feed for attendees and is unfailingly generous with supplies and mementos. Every year, he holds an auction of donated items to help pay for the event, throwing in many of his own items for the cause. Some years he doesn't even break even but he shrugs it off and looks ahead to the next year.
To some attendees, the auction provides the foundation for their own home-based forge.
"I have a shop at home and half of the equipment there I bought here at the auction," said Ken Chambers of Freeland, a hobbyist blacksmith and Folly attendee for six years.