NWBA President Lynn Gledhill
From the Presidential Scrap Heap
Greetings All Blacksmiths:
I just returned from the NWBA Spring Conference. What a great conference!!! I think most everyone really enjoyed this event.
Dorothy Stiegler and John Williams worked for 3 days forging and assembling a gorgeous bronze bird bath. Dorothy had designed this piece with a glass bowl created just for this piece. Initially it seemed our budget for the demos was getting stretched too thin, so we came up with a less expensive bowl.
Dorothy, as the exceptional artist that she is, felt strongly that the piece wasn’t what it should be with the substitute bowl and very generously gifted the original bowl to the NWBA. Now the piece is perfectly completed in the mind of this wonderful artist, which is how it should be. Thank you so much Dorothy and John!
Our own Ben Czyhold put on a great demo producing 3 items using a variety of forging and joinery techniques. His craftsmanship is as perfect as his speech!
I want to thank all the people who gave their time, energy, and talents to make this conference great: our conference coordinators, Bruce Crittenden and Brent Christiansen; Anne Bujold for the library; Lisa Geertsen for the gallery; Mark Manley for the sound systems; Scott Rash and Darryl Nelson for registration; Eric Sprado and Larry Langdon for the auction; the hands-on instructors; and a host of others who worked behind the scenes.
I am already looking forward to the monthly hammer-ins and demos and certainly Blacksmith week at Government Camp August 21 thru Aug. 24.
As we head into summer I am thinking of how we can do more outreach and education. Our mentoring center is a great start and has been very successful. I want to see us reaching more younger people. Let me know your thoughts and ideas.
Good forging!
Lynn