Those who could blacksmith would expertly ply the trade having positions of status in their communities. The number of people with the surname “Smith” and its counterpart name in other languages reflects the number of people once involved in metalworking, and the importance of those with special knowledge and skills.

When most people are asked to envision forging, the image is of a burly blacksmith in a dark and fiery forge, wielding a hammer to pound hot metal on an old-fashioned anvil – sparks flying. While blacksmiths and metalsmiths still ply the trade, hammer forging has come far beyond those original processes. Our advanced technology and methods are some that no blacksmith of even 100 years ago could have ever imagined.

From Industrial Revolution era steam powered forges, the industry has advanced to highly automated equipment. The industry is continually evolving alloys and forgeable composites, and computational modeling and simulation to speed and assist design and engineering. Most forge shops, today, no longer resemble the dark caverns with flame belching furnaces.