Essentially Blessed
By Tim Hartigan MCM President 2009-2010
We
are blessed. We, you and I, work in the most fascinating of businesses. Who
among us cannot say that they love it completely? I hope that you are like
me and cannot wait to get out of bed in the morning, go back to the foundry
and start at it again.
We are essential. We make things. They are useful things. Our society and
civilization itself would cease to function without castings. The way we
make these things is primal and poetic. It is scientific, complex, artistic
and simple. Out of the elements we found essential objects. (Found, a verb,
derives from the Latin fundere meaning to pour, melt or cast.)
MCM is essential. Take a look at the mission statement of MCM at the top of
this page. Our job, that of this organization and each of its members, is to
make sure that our social institutions and particularly people in government
understand the crucial role of this industry. This is about more than our
own self interest. That’s important, too. I like to eat. But, we serve
ourselves best by making sure that all of the stakeholders in this industry
realize that without us everything stops.
You cannot name a person in America that is not dependent from before
birth on castings in direct and indirect ways. The hermit on the mountain,
you say? I bet he has a cast iron skillet. He walks the road to town to buy
flour. The road was made by machines built in Peoria. The wheat for the
flour was grown on farms and ground in mills that have a casting dependency
legacy that is broad and deep. Castings cultivate the crops, move the
trucks, lift the sewage, generate the electricity, transport the oil, defend
freedom, and support the playgrounds. We make things that pump, transport,
hold, and dump. We even make things that make things.
You are essential. I urge you to become involved. What is that something
which impassions you? Are you moved by excessive regulation? I am. Today in
my mail I had an invoice for $800 for hazardous substances storage. The
substance? The copper contained in bronze! No, really. I had another invoice
for $1400 to restate the plan document for a pension plan that has been
closed for 28 years. A third envelope from the Census Bureau says I’m
invited to participate in a survey and my participation is required by
Federal Law. That was today’s mail. Who knows what tomorrow will bring?
That’s why I am involved. I am one small voice. Nobody hears me. But, we the
members of this essential industry can, if we stick together, make a
significant sound. We can be heard. If we are smart, we can make ourselves
heard by people that can change the things that nibble away at our days,
keeping us from our essential function.
I am impassioned by those ridiculous obstacles erected by ignorant people
who sit in cubicles all day thinking up ways to hang weights on the arms of
us, the essential ones. But I’m more passionate about founding essential
objects. I am a very blessed man to do this essential thing that I love.