African American Blacksmiths

Source:

Williamsburg, VA, Historical Interpreter Blacksmith, 1. Interview. By Atticus Uyttendaele. The Colonial Museum , 2015.

Paraphrase:

Africans had been using metal for a long time

They don’t make tools the same way as the English Blacksmiths

They worked with the English Blacksmiths if they were slaves for the Blacksmith

The African’s tools would look different but be used in the same way

If the African’s master died while he was a slave for him, the slave would run the shop and be free

My Ideas:

African Americans, Native Americans and the English blacksmiths all had the same tools, but they were made differently. The Africans made axes out of metal, like the English, but they looked very different. The Natives made axes out of stone instead of iron. The English made axes out of iron, like the Africans. Each culture had the same tools, but made differently.

Did the Africans have blacksmiths in America, besides the ones that worked with the English blacksmiths? I think that there would have been, but not until an enslaved person’s master died and he inherited the shop. Then the shop would’ve been inherited through the generations of that family.

I wonder if the Africans made any tools that the English and Natives didn’t? They might have needed different tools because of the difference in their cultures. The English had hammer to shape the iron, the Natives carved the stone, and the Africans might have had something in between. I think that they might have had a version of a hammer, maybe a wooden handle with a flat end and a pointy end. They might have used hammers as well as the English, but they probably looked different.

In humanities we had to do research on our colonial topics. Mine is Blacksmithing. This is my favorite notecard I did. I feel like I made a lot of connections in my analysis and expanded on the original idea well. I think that I could have included more connections to the Natives, and how their blacksmithing was similar.