Joe & Dan,

Thank you! God willing Joe I will be there.

Michael,

Hope to meet you there. We can exchange cameras and take photos of each other working. That way we both would have some pics to share with the forum.

Regards,

George

I just got off the phone with Texarkana College. I wanted to make sure the class wasnt full. They have 4 paid registrations so far. I filled mine out and will get the check enroute this afternoon. So mine will be number 5. I look forward to seeing everyone. Mike

I will also be taking this course with Joe. I have a couple hidden tang knives ready to bring and will be finishing the full tang knife this evening. I wont be bringing much for tools/etc as I am coming from Canada and it will just cause more problems at the border. We are leaving Thursday and flying into Memphis and going to spend the weekend with Chad Nichols. We have a car rented and will drive to Hope on Sunday afternoon. I am also bringing my wife as well.

See you all there.

Jim Clow

Ill be there Sunday. Looking forward to seeing everyone..Mike

The news...

...While I planned in advance to go I did not know until mid Sept., that I would not be able to go to the class. I am retired and bladesmithing is my main activity. I took on a part-time job as the sales agent of bank owned property in June with the agreement I would attend the closings on behalf of the bank. My first closing was to be Sept 18 and it was postponed until Oct 24-25. Thus I could not make the class. Weil with the storm "Sandy" off the coast of Florida there will be no closing until after the storm.

That's the bad news and now the good news... ... since I am in South Florida my shop which is on the back porch is \safe I am here to put it away and close up shop to protect my equipment from the driving rain and high winds.

I had really wanted to take the class with Joe Keeslar, MS since I have his book and his leather sheath DVD. I will be looking to see when he will be teaching the class again. (My computer got a virus and I just got it scrubbed and working again without loosing my data files)

I did finish my two blades anyway and will post them later, I am going to finish them and make two new one when I can take the class. The more I do, the better they will get.

Regards,

George

We just finished the class yesterday and it was a great learning experience and met some great people as well. We were very fortunate to have the only MS from France (Jean-Paul) and Tim PMS from Louisianna there to help Joe Keeslar MS. There was only 6 students and 3 instructors. This was a great ratio. You can sure tell that Joe was a school teacher as he was a great teacher and knew how to convey his messages. There was no questions that went unanswered during the 5 days of classes.

Met some great people and hope to meet up again with them again in the future.

Now back to the deep freeze in Canada.

Thanks again to Joe, Jean-Paul and Tim.

Jim Clow

Sounds like you had a great time Jim.....now maybe you can teach this Montana boy the right way to build a guard and handle??? <img src=' http://www.americanbladesmith.com/ipboard/public/style_emoticons//smile.gi f' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':)' />

|quoted:

Sounds like you had a great time Jim.....now maybe you can teach this Montana boy the right way to build a guard and handle??? <img src=' http://www.americanbladesmith.com/ipboard/public/style_emoticons//smile.gi f' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':)' />

Ed

You are a master of handles and guards. I'm hope I can learn more about this aspect of the knife building as it is my weak point of knife making. I was forunate to learn lots on this 5 day course at Bill Moran school but as you know, there is always more to learn.

Jim

here are a few pics of the handles and guards class

heres the pics

|quoted:

heres the pics

Joe Keeslar does not swing a hammer he swings an anvil!

This was a great Handles and Guards Class with several very talented instructors. Below are more photos.

Master Smith Jean-Paul Thevenot visiting from France demonstrating hand sanding

Tim Potier listening in on one of Joe Keeslar' s many lectures

Tom drilling out his handle material for hidden tang knife

Master Smith Tim Potier doing a side demo of hand sanding jig clamp

Jim Clow's wife checking out the shop at the Moran School

Mike working on an oval design for a guard

Joe Keeslar lecturing