Bill was 65, and is survived by his wife Bonnie, three sons, two daughters and seven grandchildren. Bill was born and died in Burlington, WI, where he established his business, Centaur Forge Ltd., (details page 2).

Bill Pieh established Centaur Forge, Ltd. in 1960. His early catalogs were no more than a few stapled sheets. According to Richard Postman in Anvils in America Centaur took over the importation of Swedish Kohlswa anvils from the Swedish-American Steel Company in 1960. These anvils were sold with the Centaur trademark until the mid eighties when they started having a quality problem.

As late as 1977 the Centaur catalog was only 28 pages (14 sheets plus order forms). Today it is over 200 pages.

In the 70's Bill Pieh added the Kuhn air hammer line to the list of tools and equipment he had made or imported. He said, "I brought one of these to the Purchase, N.Y Conference. Everyone liked it".
When I first met Bill at the Ripley, WV ABANA conference in 1984 he was showing off Kuhn hammers and when I met him again at Asheville in 1998 he was still showing off Kuhn hammers.