Will Stelter is a popular bladesmith and YouTuber.
He has more than 200 thousand subscribers on his YouTube channel by name, Will Stelter.
Introduction-
Will Stelter was born on 24 June 2000.
He hails from Seattle, Washington State, United States.
His mother’s name is Kay Morgan Stelter.
Will has two siblings, a sister, Eleanor Stelter and a brother, Henry Stelter.
In 2017, Will earned an Eagle Scout.
Love for bladesmithing-
At 13, he started bladesmithing with minimal resources at his parents’ house.
During that time, Will started watching a lot of YouTube videos about bladesmithing.
But even after watching that many videos for a year, he couldn’t learn much and couldn’t attain good results.
Then, Will started offering help at the bladesmithing shops in order to learn forging.
As he was young, many bladesmiths used to happily teach him their techniques.
Later, Will got a little forge for forging knives and at 16, he got 1-inch by 30-inch belt sander and a forge and began to seriously forge knives in his 100 sq ft. garage space.
Then, he tried blacksmithing by partnering with other blacksmiths but his main focus was on bladesmithing.
His mentors-
In 2016, Will met two skilled bladesmiths, Salem Straub, and Daniel O’ Malley and they became his bladesmithing mentors.
Thanks to Salem, he learnt about designing, forging knives and making (Damascus) pattern weld steel.
Daniel owns the Blade Gallery, a cutlery store in Seattle, Washington and he used to critique Will’s work.
Forged in Fire-
Once, Will got scheduled for the Forged in Fire reality TV show but he couldn’t participate in it as during that time he was busy moving from Seattle to Montana and had a wedding to attend.
Even though he received the paperwork, he didn’t sign the contract.
Meeting Alec Steele-
Will met Alec Steele at a train station in Norwich, England through their common friend, Jakob Faram.
Alec invited him to his workshop in Europe and six months later, Will visited his workshop and both of them made a Damascus Pirate’s Cutlass.
Working with Alec Steele-
After completing his schooling, Will shifted to Montana to attend Montana State University.
While in his first year of college, Alec invited him to work with him on his blacksmithing projects and his YouTube channel.
So, after studying for a year at Montana State University, Will dropped out.
Then, for a couple of years until December 2020, he worked with Alec on his YouTube channel by name, Alec Steele.
Here, Will along with Alec worked on various projects like making knives, swords, etc. and greatly improved his skills and also learnt many new things.
An interesting fact- Will and Alec both are 5’8 tall.
Working on his own YouTube channel-
Will has his own YouTube channel by name, Will Stelter since 10 November 2011.
In January 2021, he quit working on Alec’s YouTube channel in order to focus on his own YouTube channel and other business.
Apart from being a full-time YouTuber, Will also makes and sells knives and kitchen utensils and restores tools.
His workshop is in Bozeman, Montana, United States and he also has a website.
As of February 2022, Will has more than 100 thousand followers on Instagram.
Other interests-
In 2019, Will took a pistol shooting class and since then, shooting became his passion.
Later, he also started instructing pistol shooting to others.
Around 2020, Will took an Emergency Medical Technicians (EMT) course hoping that it would prove helpful for him to save lives.
He is also a dog lover.
So, how are you inspired by the success story of Will Stelter?
Share with me in the comment section below.
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