GRISWOLD, Man. – He may not “smite the black metal” much these days, but blacksmith Stuart Reimer finds that the hammer and anvil can still come in handy, just as they did for his forebears in decades past.
“I do everything. Everything from engine rebuilding to welding manufacturing, general repairs and this and that,” said Reimer, who after 15 years recently sold his business in Oak Lake, Man., and moved to a new site near Griswold.
“I’m hoping to have longer jobs and fewer customers. More manufacturing and inventing. Stuff like that.”
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Once, on one of his many trips to northern Manitoba, he was asked to fix an airplane that was grounded by a loose electrical connection.
He has also built a tundra buggy, restored Bombardiers and fixed bulldozers and tractors. One job that stands out over the years involved fixing a local woman’s favourite push broom.
“That’s something you wouldn’t take to the John Deere dealership,” he said with a laugh.
“Did I make money on the job? No.”
Small town blacksmiths have become a rare breed in recent decades, which Reimer said is largely because more farmers have invested in the equipment needed to do their own work as farms become bigger.
With their own tools and shop space, many farmers are also able to do work for neighbours who used to depend on the town blacksmith.
Also, the lure of good-paying nine to five jobs at heavy equipment dealerships in the city often proves irresistible.
“In a small town, it means that you’re running your own business. There’s a horrendous amount of interruptions because you’re always dealing with your friends and neighbours who stop and chat,” he said.
“At the end of the year, you think, I could have just gone to work for so-and-so and made twice as much money with no bookwork hassles.”
Apart from one year of heavy-duty mechanic training, Reimer is largely self-taught. Part of his skill may be inherited.
His grandfather, Henry S. Reimer, was an avid inventor who held a number of patents and helped automate the assembly line at Polaris’s former snowmobile manufacturing plant in Beausejour, Man.
Reimer uses AC and DC arc welders, acetylene torches, metal lathe, hydraulic press and a MIG outfitted with a spool gun for welding aluminum.
For high volume cutting jobs, he occasionally borrows or rents a plasma cutter.
“I do use the hammer and anvil a lot. I like beating on things,” he said.
He recalled how a farmer brought in a large adjusting bolt with a seized nut that he’d struggled to loosen on his own for a day and a half.
Reimer tapped the nut with a hammer on the anvil a few times on each side to break the rust. In less than a minute, the nut was turning freely.
“There are definitely tricks you can do with a hammer that really help.”
