Help clean up & rebuild the historical Hart blacksmith shop.

Hello, and thank you for your time today.

Update- Thank you all so much. We are amazed and humbled at reaching our bare bones to clean up goal so rapidly! Again, THANK YOU. We have updated the goal, in hopes of being able to perhaps find a temporary space to work, so that we can be more able to fund the needed rebuilding ourselves.

On July 1st, 2024, our historic blacksmith shop in Hart, Michigan was destroyed by a fire, which spread from the neighbors shed. We are asking for assistance here to clean up and hopefully rebuild, so we can get back to work. Unfortunately, we did not have insurance.

Our shop, as far as we have been able to research, was the oldest continually operating blacksmith shop in the state of Michigan. The original part of the shop was a small 24x24 foot timber frame structure built in 1884. Over the years, as more space was needed, it was added onto increasing it's size a section at a time. By 1914 it had reached it's final configuration that would last for over the next 100 years, and six different owners. John Griswold, the current owner, purchased the shop and historic tooling in 1998, and has lived and worked there since.

As of this writing, we are still assessing and attempting to figure out how to go about what we hope will become the shop's future form to hopefully carry on the history of this place for the next century.

While the damage is very extensive, it appears the original 24x24 heart of the shop is may still be salvageable. Our goal, with your help, is to rebuild around this historic heart if at all possible, keeping it's history alive and still operational to teach the craft to future generations. While we will not be able to rebuild identical to the former additions, we hope to be able to do it justice and rebuild something as functional and elegant as those who came before us. And do it in a way that fits in harmoniously with the Historic District across the street, without looking like a modern pole barn. There will also be inspection for structural soundness and planning on how to go about each step in this process.

As well, we will need to find a way to keep working elsewhere during the clean up and hopeful reconstruction to continue to make money for this massive endeavor.

At the moment, we are still deeply saddened, shocked and overwhelmed, trying to recover what ever we can from the extensive collection of artifacts that were left over from the shop's past.

We thank you for your time, and any aid in this effort you may be able to provide.