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Twice a day and three times on Saturday, eager groups of visitors find their way to 30 Blake Street in Charleston, S.C. A simple metal shed stands there, behind two modest houses. The shed resembles an old garage, with tables, chairs, and pieces of iron scattered outside. But from this humble structure has come some of the most beautiful ironwork in Charleston.


The shed is the workshop of Philip Simmons, an African American blacksmith who has been living in Charleston since 1919 and working there since the mid-1920s. This month, as Simmons celebrates his 95th birthday, the National Trust named his workshop and home, which must be stabilized to protect it from hurricanes, one of America's 11 Most Endangered Historic Places.

Since he began specializing in ornamental iron in 1938, Simmons has fashioned more than five hundred of the ornate iron gates, fences, balconies, and window grills that now grace the city of Charleston. "We speak of Charleston as a museum of his work," says Rossie M. Colter, project administrator for the Philip Simmons Foundation, established in 1991.

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