Looking Back: Fires still burn for former blacksmith Tim on return to forge

Tim Davies worked as a blacksmith in a forge at Thorpe Hall (was the maternity unit and now a Sue Ryder hospice) in Peterborough for five years in the early 1980s.

He said: “It was something I always wanted to do, and the opportunity came up so I took it.

“I learned on the job and loved it all. It was a delightful and very satisfying skill to learn.”

He later went on to work out of Grimsby on the highly hazardous deep sea fishing trawlers around Greenland and beyond for two years.

Tim added: “I returned home for a more settled, safer and quieter life so became a security guard in the local job centre as I am a sociable person and I like meeting and helping people.”

Tim, who has a daughter called Gwendoline, retired in 2012 and is a regular at the Wortley Almshouses where he enjoys real ale and the good company of his friends.

Tim went to a forge which Chris had located in the village of Thorney for his reunion photo in 2020, where he met blacksmith John Downing.

He added: “I saw the forge and it started pulling on my heart strings, it brought back lots of lovely memories.”