How Previous Experience Helps
In selecting any vocation, a man’s former occupation must be carefully taken into account, and particularly is this true in the case of welding. Previous experience, training, and education are such important factors in the student’s success or failure that particular attention should be paid to them. Experience as a blacksmith, machinist, boilermaker, patternmaker, sheet-metal worker, molder, electrician, and in kindred occupations will be in every case of great value.
All experience in handling metals, as well as all mechanical experience is a valuable asset. For a man who has had such experience, it will be comparatively easy to become a good all-round welder. It goes without saying that no disabled man should take up the course unless he feels an interest in the work or in some special branch of it. It is this interest coupled with ingenuity which will make it possible for the welder to handle new problems successfully and to devise better and more efficient ways of doing things.
In the case of a former welder who is capable of taking up his former vocation, a short course of training will suffice. A former welder whose handicap prevents him from taking up his old trade may, with the proper training and necessary qualifications, become an excellent teacher, a welding foreman, or a superintendent.