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Roy Bellows
in Buda
Roy Bellows has recently moved from Fredricksburg and has almost completed the setup of his new forge shop in an old "chicken coop" behind his new home in Buda, just south of Austin. The primary topic of the Balcones Forge meeting was to be about forging branding irons.
Roy has been an accomplished blacksmith artist for some time now, and contributed often to The Forge Review which began in 1982, later becoming The Texas Forge Review and the beginning of TABA.
The entire group joined in the discussion of branding irons and many examples were discussed. This is a special topic for Roy as he was once a sign maker, creating letters of steel to be mounted on signage.
Dave Koenig and Richard Boswell made the early morning trip over and visited with many old and new friends on a bright and chilly winter day. Dave provided this short summary note:
"Yesterday's meeting was quite special. It's the only shop meeting I ever attended where there was not a whiff of smoke and the meeting was fantastic!
And, who would have bet a penny that Roy and Rudy would each get one of two 'double letter' trade items out of 12? that would apply specifically to them.....BF for Bellow Forge and RB for Rudy Billings.
And, maybe even more surprising, who would have guessed that so many people would would have chimed in on the 'doors discussion'.
And, not to be undone, Terry Ross let us all know he revamped an open source drafting program (SketchUp from Google) to allow smiths to not only draw tapers but estimate a cut list..... and he is willing to teach us.
It was quite an event!!!!....and another reinforcement of the talents and knowledge of the people in the smithing community who are willing to share what they know. Whow!!!!
Attached are two scanned items. One is the cover of the book I left at home yesterday and the other is the recipe for forging the letter B....in German, French and Photo. This is a 1979 book I purchased in the mid 80's so I hope it is still available. Fridolin Wolf is the author and Charles Coleman is the publisher."
Finally, someone asked Roy if those were the famous Doors from his old shop, waiting to be mounted in the new shop. These doors contain a collection of wisdom and key details of metallurgy, time, and the human condition. Roy then explained what most of this metaphysical art was, and many from the audience participated with questions and suggestions.
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