The Call!

[mariano gugliot]

Is a good question
When you get the call?, the call of fire I means.

I remember when I was 9 years old, I saw my father forging on the garage, he was forging a Kama (a japanese weapon). The shop was just an anvil, 1 hamer, and the chorcal forge.
He ask me to hold the kama with a clamp while he added coal in the forge, I say yes jejejeje
The steel was orange and I had sencacion to want to touch it, as if me it was requesting it.
Well that day the forging get deep in to my soul and never get out.

Saludos

Mariano

[EdgarFigaro]

I'm really not sure.
I've always liked all things fantasy.
Played video games early on, Legend of Zelda being one of the first Fantasy based ones back on the NES, from there into other Roleplaying fantasy games.
Medieval faires...fantasy books...artwork...
Have played some online RPG fantasy games now for alot longer than I would have magined when first starting.

Not sure what it is, just always had a connection to that type of stuff. Always liked medieval and fantasy weaponry. Played a blacksmith in some of the games and always liked the idea of making things.

Really love making things, so I guess it was only time until I would finally decide to finally give it a try myself. So I pieced together a makeshift forge, and went to work.

And I love it. Just as I love woodworking, and pottery, and drawing, and just in general creating things with my own hands.

It's also neat having the connection to our ancestors for thousands of years into the past. Through making things and forging.

Suppose I've always been enticed by fire as well. I remember always playing with the flames in candles and such, got called a pyro by my Spanish teacher in high school, very nice little Italian woman, good friend as well. I suppose deep down, we all kind of are pyros as we have the connection to the fire through forging.

So I'm really not sure when it hit me, I suppose in a way it's always been there in some form or another since I was very little.

[SheepishLion]

The roar of the fire, the sound of the hammer. I'm not sure but it's all part of the call to this hobby. As long as I can remember I've been really interested in metalwork. Seeing period craftsmen work metal sort of ignited (bad pun) my soul and I started to read up on smithing in general.

But really... It's all about being a fan of fire. I love fire! Any kind of fire, but the more intense the better. Turning a piece of solid steel into a malleable work is really what makes me love this so much.

Joe Nelson

PS- I could go on and on, but I'll leave it at that.

[toddhill]

It started for me when I stepped into a blacksmith's shop. He is a friend of my wife's family, and has now become my good friend. One of the real old time guys. He knew Donald Streeter, Francis Whitaker, and some of the other big name guys. When I stepped into his shop and he started showing me around, I knew I wanted to get into this. He also made fantastic knives and hawks. After I started forging I just kind of morphed into being obsessed with blades. No going back.

[Tai Google]

I got the call when I was a young man. It was back in the 70s. I had made some knives by stock reduction, but didn't hear "the call" until I picked up a hammer and lit my first fire. I didn't have a teacher for bladesmithing, but was studying jewelry and metalsmithing in college. I set up a little coal burning rivet forge in my backyard and sold my first knife in 1978. The rest is history.

[jdm61]

Guild Show circa 1993-94 in Orlando. I had ben reading up on custom knives for a while and had alwasy wanted a Randall back in my military days, but meeting a number a guys at the show and particularly seeing Al Pendray's wootz stuff got me hooked on forged knives. It just took 11 or 12 years to do something about it The knife that probably got my attention the most at that show was a Jay Hendrickson persian fighter with the sliver wire treatment. A purveyor had is for sale for $800, which I did not have on hand at the time, so i bought a knife from Joe Flournoy. Still don't have one of those fighters from Jay, but I do have two of his hunters.

[Blaine Whitney]

I've always wanted to make knives. In 7th and 8th grade I'd sneak a shank I ground out on the bench grinder in Metal Shop. No real interest in forging until my wife misplaced an old Western Bowie in her storage area (it'll be found when we DIE). I got that Hoods Woods video about a year and a half ago....and the light came on. It just keeps getting better.