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The blacksmiths of Klaipėda were already known in the 16th century. Blacksmiths, later on also locksmiths, supplied local builders with forged nails, binding for doors and windows, weather-cocks, street lanterns, hand-rails, doors and binding for ovens.
The handicrafts in the Klaipėda region, including blacksmithing, not only reflected the traditions of the area but in the 16th–18th centuries and especially in the 19th century handicrafts were strictly regulated by the laws of the Prussian authorities. In the middle of the 19th century the blacksmiths of the Klaipėda region commenced casting and making metal crosses and fences for graves all over the country.
The main manufacturers of cemetery monuments and fences at the end of the 19th century were Klaipėda blacksmith forges. The addresses of the forges included Kepėjų St. 10, Puodžių St. 14, Šaltkalvių St. 1 (G. Katzke forge-shop).
G. Katzke, the famous blacksmith in Klaipėda and the Klaipėda region, and his apprentices founded his workshop in a house in Šaltkalvių Street at the end of the 19th century in 1895. The blacksmiths were busy making farming tools and equipment and ornamental elements for the houses of the Old Town. G. Katzke won his popularity first of all by making artistic cemetery crosses, fences and gates. In 1978 a monument of an original form with the stamp "H. G. Katzke Landw. Maschinen. Memel" was discovered in Vilkyčiai Cemetery in the Šilutė District. The activities of G. Katzke are also demonstrated by his advertisements published in 1911 to 1914.
G. Katzke was the only blacksmith in Klaipėda region to be awarded an international silver medal for artistic blacksmithing. His forge existed up to 1944 – when the war front approached Klaipėda, G. Katzke left for Germany.
After World War II Lithuania Minor had a very small number of inhabitants. At the end of January 1945 only some dozens of local people were left. There was nobody to take care of the historical and cultural monuments of the town of Klaipėda and the Klaipėda region. A specific feature of the after-war years was the decay of Klaipėda town cemetery whose deliberate destruction and removal finally became official when in 1974 the process of destroying the cemetery commenced. Metal crosses, fences and other items were turned into scrap metal. Dionyzas Varkalis, a blacksmith and metal restorer from Klaipėda, succeeded in saving some cemetery monuments, including 8 truck loads of crosses, fences and gates.
Some time later D. Varkalis discovered a blacksmith shop in a half-destroyed building of the Old Town in Šaltkalvių Street that belonged to Gustav Katzke, a famous blacksmith from Klaipėda. The original equipment and tools of the old master had survived. Then the idea to restore this and one more building and to establish a permanent exhibition of blacksmith work was born. The idea was supported by Alfonsas Žalys, former chairman of the Klaipėda Executive Committee. The buildings were transferred to the Department of Culture and the finances for the redesigning and other restoration work were allocated.
As soon as the restoration of the old blacksmith shop was completed, D. Varkalis concentrated on the renewal of blacksmithing as an occupation. He opened a temporary exhibition of crosses and fences from cemeteries. In 1991 the management of the old blacksmith shop went to the History Museum of Lithuania Minor where D. Varkalis was nominated the head of the blacksmiths' exhibition. After the complete restoration of the main building in 1992, the Blacksmith Museum was opened as a branch of the History Museum of Lithuania Minor.
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