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US man's anvil collection hammers the competition

Corky Helms kneels by a few samples of the morre than 700 anvils he has in his collection at his home in Mascoutah, Illinois, last month. PHOTO: AP

For a few decades now, Corky Helms has been amassing anvils, more than 700 of them.

The retired educator-turned-cattleman hordes a prized collection ranging from 187kg to barely an 28g, from 60cm tall to something that is hardly the size of a thimble.

They come from around the world, from Pennsylvania to Russia, the Czech Republic to China, England and even Sweden. Some are relics of blacksmithing, others merely miniatures crafted as paperweights. Some are toys, smaller than a thumbprint.

Big or small, they raise the sizable question: Why?

Helms only shrugs.

"They're just kind of unique, made in various centuries and over different periods of time," said Helms, whose vanity license plate on his full-sized pickup truck even reads "4 ANVIL."

That vehicle has come in quite handy for lugging the anvils he's acquired over the years at everything from flea markets to auctions, always looking for a novel addition to an array of anvils that the uninitiated might find remarkably unremarkable.

Spend any time with Helms, and he will hammer home the differences.

"Better anvils are made of better steel," he insists. Each anvil makes a different ring -- something he demonstrates by grabbing a small hammer and whacking a few of the couple hundred anvils he is displaying through April 7 at the Mascoutah Heritage Museum.

Some have the high-pitched clarity of bells, thanks to their steel-plated tops or crafting of harder metal.

"I think it'd be interesting to set them up and play them" by pitches, Helms said.

He got his first anvil as a college student in the 1950s, using it to shoe horses. His collecting caught fire after his father-in-law gave him one.

When Helms found that many anvils bear names, including those of businesses, he realized he had to have them, including his 106kg, New York-made Hay Budden model that some consider the Cadillac of anvils.

Helms has anvils used by watchmakers, jewelers and eye doctors. Anvils carved out of soap or coal. Anvil banks and candle holders. An empty Avon cologne bottle in the shape of an anvil. Some hand-sized ones are ceramic, others porcelain. A miniature anvil dates to the 1904 World's Fair in St. Louis.

Itching to see a lap anvil, what pioneering folks used while traveling? Yep, Helms has it.

He won't guess how much his collection weighs or what it might be worth. But he thinks it is something mighty -- so much so that he is guarded about divulging where he lives, fearing someone someday might make off with his metal.

Storage is not a problem; Helms and his wife of 47 years, Vicki, live on a farm, where outbuildings offer ample room for all things anvil.

"There's anvils everywhere, but it's not like they're running us out of the house," Vicki Helms says. "I think it's a wonderful hobby. If he enjoys it, I think it's fine. We've met a lot of interesting people through anvils."

Helms even has admirers, including a trade magazine's overseer who calls Helms' collection "formidable."

"I'm not sure of anybody with that many anvils," said Rob Edwards, editor of the Anvil's Ring, the 5,000-circulation publication of the North Carolina-based Artist-Blacksmith's Association of North America. "A real good collection is not that common."

Nor cheap. Edwards said a used anvil might fetch US$4 a kilogram. "Certain anvils are worth a helluva lot more," depending on their age or even their ring, he said.

Regardless, Edwards seems to have forged a following, of sorts.

With about 40 anvils at his Falling Anvil Studios in Troy, New York, artist Michael Oatman finds the breadth of Helms' collection staggering.

"For me, it was natural to collect these things," he said of his trophies, ranging from an anvil tie tack weighing a 100 grams to a full-fledged 6.8kg anvil. Each has a name, including Shemp and Hercules.

Oatman speaks of them in romantic terms: "They're in the pantheon of shapes that I think are really ominous and cool."

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