Just before COVID-19 really took hold, Steve and I had a wonderful date day at Red Top Mountain state park. We went to one of their iron pours to test our scratch block carving skills.
You purchase a scratch block from the visitor’s center and settle down to design and carve the block that will later be filled with molten iron.
The blocks themselves were rather soft and we found that the best tools to carve were nails and even a paper clip for detailed work.
We turned in our blocks, and then waited for dark and the real excitement — the firing of the furnace and pouring of the iron.
Anne Ledbetter 