You
may have seen him at the Columbia County Fair. If you let your ears
follow the pop and woosh sound of the single stroke engine display
you’d find him next door. He’d be hard at work in the
building housing people who love to work with their hands, weaving
baskets, spinning thread or creating a chair with hand tools.
Bob Engel is the broad shouldered man in the plaid shirt, his sleeves
rolled up, his cap cocked back on his head. Usually a group of young
people is gathered around, intently watching, eyes filled with amazement
witnessing a timeless art. Bob is a blacksmith and the easy grin
on his face is the product of his work.
Bob Engel was born in Brooklyn but his family moved to Stockport
when he was a baby. He grew up like just about any kid in rural
America in the 1940’s, running in the woods and playing cowboys
and Indians. He loved old things, heritage and history. He built
the log home he lives in today because when he was a boy Abe Lincoln’s
log cabin intrigued him. He attended Ichabod Crane High School,
passing Lindenwald everyday. Martin Van Buren’s home had fallen
into disrepair back then and it upset him, “It just wasn’t
right for a president’s house to be dilapidated like that,
I thought. The restoration was a super change. I still take regular
walks there.”
Bob joined the Air Force following high school and got a degree
in electronics. He wound up stationed on the DEW Line, the Distant
Early Warning Station in Labrador, Canada. It was the Cold War and
they were on the lookout for Russians. “I spent two long dark
winters up there before I was transferred to California. Quite a
change from 43 degrees below zero, guess they wanted to thaw me
out,” Bob laughs.
Electronics just didn’t hold his interest, so when he returned
home after two years in California he went into the building trades.
He started building houses then moved on to larger projects, Bliss
Tower, Hudson Terrace, Price Chopper and the Dunn Memorial Bridge.
He shifted over to the Stockport Highway department in the early
70’s and stayed for 20 years before moving to Columbia County
building maintenance.
Looking for a craft to supplement his eventual retirement, Bob began
learning shoe repair. In this disposable world, why repair shoes?
“One word, gratifying. Blacksmiths were the first recyclers,
shoe repair is another form.” Bob trained with Joe Bent for
a year and a half. “Joe never said, ‘that’s good
enough.’ It was either good or he gave it back to me to do
over. It takes a little longer to do it right once, a lot longer
to do it wrong twice.” Bob’s work is first-rate so people
still drop their shoes off at Brown’s in Chatham for Bob to
repair and pick up them up the following week.
Back in the mid 70’s he had some metal that needed to be bent
to mend a plow. One week later Bob stumbled on to a blacksmithing
class offered at the Hancock Shaker Village near Pittsfield. He
took the class, studying with master smith Bill Senseney, and it
got in his blood; immediately he began shopping around for old hammers
and anvils and a forge. “Once you smell the coal smoke you’re
hooked. Learning what heat can do to metal, taking a solid, immovable
object and reshaping is fascinating. Hot metal is like modeling
clay.”
Bob made all the iron for his house, door latches, hinges, doorknockers,
boot scrapers. Bob picks up a tire iron, “What’s this
look like to you?”
“A tire iron.”
He fingers the hex end, “Looks like a candle holder to me.”
Bob joined the Berkshire Blacksmiths in 1987, a group formed by
Bill Senseney to promote blacksmithing, there were seven members
at the time, today there are 200. Blacksmiths were notoriously secretive
about the tricks of their trade, unfortunately many extraordinary
techniques died with the old guys. “It’s important to
pass it along, share the knowledge, otherwise it’ll be lost
forever.” Bob’s friend Francis Fabiano told him there
were once seven blacksmith shops in Hudson, now they’re gone,
the heritage is lost. This is why Bob demonstrates his craft at
every opportunity around the area; anywhere he can practice this
fascinating art form.
Bob will soon resume his studies advancing to the next level of
blacksmithing. “Everybody should learn blacksmithing to gain
the patience needed to raise a family. You’ll be a better
parent. With blacksmithing you can’t rush the fire, you have
to wait for the iron to get hot, then one step at a time you mold
and shape it. Kids are the future of blacksmithing, all kids from
70 on down.”
A few years ago Bob had a female apprentice, now she’s teaching,
passing it down, “There’s no pay in it, but you don’t
work 85 hours in five days if you don’t love it.” Bob
grins and tells me his dream is to be good enough to train others
to be master smiths, “Teaching teaches you, pushes you to
be better.”
We’ll talk next time From The Road.
