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Tuesday, Nov. 10

EGREMONT -- Instead of hitting the books, Great Barrington Waldorf High School freshman are forging iron.

Every Friday afternoon, the school's five freshmen file into an old blacksmith barn in North Egremont. In this space, Sheffield-based blacksmith John F. Graney is their mentor.

In the studio, students trade their brand name jackets for work sweatshirts and their bookbags for bars of iron stock. As the students get to work, their teenage chatter becomes quickly upstaged by the clanging of hammer to metal and sizzle of hot iron being dipped into a cool water bath.

"It's awesome," said Ben Baum, 15.

Nearby, his classmate Kyle Bashour, 14, works on flattening a rod of iron stock, which will later be forged into a fork. In the background, Sam O'Brient, 15, works on forging a J-hook, while a nearly 15-year-old Aneli Poland, the lone female for the day, pounds out a scrolled edge for a towel ring. Robin Graney, John Graney's daughter, was out sick for the day.

The weekly two-hour class is part of the school's practical art curriculum. The class is now in its eighth year of being offered through the Waldorf school.

"It's been great for us," said faculty chairman and teacher Stephen Keith Sagarin, who drove the students to the class last Friday.

In his own observations of the blacksmithing class for a recent school newsletter, he wrote: "Blacksmithing is practical in a metaphorical sense. It

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teaches care and balance and consequence -- each blow of the hammer impacts the world, literally, as each human thought and action does metaphorically. Light blows don't work and heavy blows damage the work. Rhythm guides the work, and an arrhythmic approach fatigues."

The rural studio is cool and dark in November. The coal-burning fire burns between 1,200 and 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit. And the students' arms absorb the impact of iron caught between the surface of a steel anvil and a hammer.

"It's a lot of work. It hurts your arms a lot. But it's good work," said O'Brient.

"I love this class," said Graney, "It's a hand-eye coordination thing. It's also a confidence builder, especially when you're working with fire so hot it can go through you."

Despite a few calluses and a minor burn, Poland forged on. "Just the experience, it's really fun, especially for the ninth grade to do on our own. Whether you use it, it's something we won't forget," she said.