If you are rich you can order one from any number of small horseshoeing supply houses. In Texas, check out C & M Horseshoe in Conroe. Still a good inexpensive source of hard coal...

The rest of us can find them in the following places:

• antique/junk shops - not those fancy places in mid-town, we mean down in the dirt, sift thru the stuff, make an offer and avoid the chickens kinda place

• old machine shops - the older the better. they probably have one or two in the back. they don't want to part with them. when they find out you want to use them the way they were intended they will offer to drive them to your shop on the back of the company flatbed

• old farms - especially in the midwest and south. that's because people were still actually making everything they needed right there on the farm less than 50 years ago

• steal that rail - the railroads have been upgrading track all over the country lately. a 4 foot section of old rail laying on the side of the road with 400 kindred feet is not only scrap it is history, and it's a damn good anvil. heavy though, bring a friend. the rail's biggest problem is that it does not have a horn and so cylindrical shaping must be done with another device

• rural hardware/feed/tack stores - if you are located in one of the top 10 metro areas please skip to the next section. for the rest of the world head towards the farms/ranches/agriculture nearest where you live. On a major road somewhere is a hardware and/or feed/tack store unless you live in antartica. find it. somewhere in the back or holding up a door, or in some cases holding up the edge of a building will be an anvil that you can barter for

• go to china - they make soft but good anvils there and they are cheap if you can find one in the states. we have one that we liberated with $80 from a welder's supply in bastrop, texas. in fact it got this whole project started, but that's another story...these are good starter anvils and you can sometimes find them at machine & welding supply shops, sometimes farm & ranch suppliers

• go to england - and especially the antique shops and look for a Peter Wright anvil and you will be blessed almost as much as american express...on the other hand this is the type of thing you tend to discover at antique/junk shops

• I-beam substitute - much like the railroad rail, the the I-beam is big enough (4"x6") and if cut short enough makes a decent anvil. like the rail it has no horn

No, you can burn:

• 80 lbs charcoal every 2 hours

• 270 lbs of hardwood

• 400 lbs of dung

• the type of coal a blacksmith can work with today is generally known as "shop coal". it is usually a high grade bituminous, in nuggets about marble to golf ball size. there was some very hard anthracite running around Texas last summer - it would burn hot but would not light without the bituminous underneath - ergo you may need to mix (we do)

• we are in the process of putting together a blacksmithing only coal that we will sell in 35 & 70lb bags shipped UPS. if you are interested send us an email and we will let you know when we are ready to ship and the final prices. in the meantime you can generally find coal sources in ABANA and many of the other sites on the Links page.