SUNY Canton Students Launch New Campus Forging Club, NCPR Reports

North Country Public Radio (NCPR) reports that students at SUNY Canton have started a new forging club, giving members hands-on instruction in blacksmithing. The report, published by the North Country's public broadcaster, marks one of the more visible additions to student life at the Canton, New York campus this fall.

What Did NCPR Report About SUNY Canton's Forging Club?

NCPR's coverage centers on the club's formation and the basic craft it teaches: working hot metal at the forge and anvil, a skill set the outlet frames as newly available to SUNY Canton students. NCPR did not publish alongside its report a roster of instructors, a club charter, meeting schedule, or membership count, so those specifics cannot be confirmed here. Readers who want the full account, including any student interviews NCPR conducted, should consult the original NCPR story, the primary source for this development.

How Does This Fit a Broader Blacksmithing Revival?

SUNY Canton's club is not an isolated data point. Elsewhere, a Scottish craftsman reopened a working forge in Gretna Green, a border town once famous for blacksmith-officiated weddings, after roughly 150 years without one, according to an earlier Breakthrough Blacksmithing report. In Oregon, a Portland blacksmith began offering structured knife-forging classes to the public, per a separate Breakthrough Blacksmithing story. Neither report is connected to SUNY Canton, but together the three stories point to renewed public and institutional interest in traditional metalworking across different settings — a college campus, a historic town, and a private studio.

What Details Remain Unconfirmed?

NCPR's report does not specify enrollment numbers, whether the club has a faculty advisor, what equipment the group uses, or how it is funded. Those gaps mean this piece stops short of characterizing the club's size or ambitions beyond what NCPR published: that it exists and that it teaches blacksmithing to SUNY Canton students.

What To Watch Next

• Whether SUNY Canton's student newspaper or NCPR publishes a follow-up with attendance figures or a named advisor.
• Whether the club schedules public demonstrations, a common next step for newly formed campus craft groups.
• Whether other SUNY campuses announce similar hands-on trade clubs in the coming academic year.

SUNY Canton is part of the State University of New York system and is based in Canton, New York, in the state's North Country region, the area NCPR covers as its regional public radio outlet.