Thread: Blade forger Sheffield

Interesting video featuring Albert Craven a blade forger from Sheffield, showing his craft.

Wow! It's amazing that he is still doing this after 72 years. I think he said he was trained by the company Joseph Rodgers. A true craftsman!

That's fantastic - thanks for sharing! I love watching true craftsmen work.

Just a lovely gentleman who is rightly proud of his craft. Thanks for posting.

Bob

That was great. A great example of that generation of men.

men that took pride in a job well done jimmy thanks for posting its a cool vid

Originally Posted by rmalak

Wow! It's amazing that he is still doing this after 72 years. I think he said he was trained by the company Joseph Rodgers. A true craftsman!

Yes he did say he was trained by the J. Rodgers co for sure.

Another interesting video!

Interesting that they aren't using respirators or eye protection beyond their reading glasses. I guess he isn't worried about 'grinder's disease.'
Silicosis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

Interesting that they aren't using respirators or eye protection beyond their reading glasses. I guess he isn't worried about 'grinder's disease.'
Silicosis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Different times. People cared jack about their own bodies, and considered it just normal that a given job would wear out your body at a certain rate. Even today, many people like bricklayers and ditch diggers have the same attitude. I was told that using gloves and goggles and respiration masks on a construction site is a sure way to draw flak from old hands. It is still considered girly, although that is starting to change with the current generation of workers. And many workers I know don't even use goggles or a dust mask when using an angle grinder on concrete or tiles.

Anyway, in those days, people didn't think about it. People didn't even tie a handkerchief over their mouth when grading a new grindstone, which covered them from head to toe in a thick white coat of dust.

Razor grinder had it good, with their slow stones. That was a prestigious job. Next came knife grinders. And at the very bottom of the barrel came fork grinders. Due to the nature of their work, fork grinders rarely lived past 28 years. Lungs full of grit does that.

File makers had good lungs, but died mad as a doornail because they ingested lots of lead particles from the lead sheet on which they hammered divots in the files.

Good times...