Bullseye: Return of the Longbow

You can add the bow and arrow to that list, too ”“ an ancient technology that’s enjoying growing interest in the United States. Accordingly, an immense wing of the recent Great American Outdoor Show in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, was devoted entirely to the wide world of archery, where Damian Ives, with a company called G.I. Bow, was working at the most basic end of the spectrum: the longbow.

New doesn’t mean better, said Ives, and old doesn’t mean useless. The longbow is the purest, oldest form of archery. No gizmos, no gimmicks and long hours of practice required. Not many people use them these days, but there’s certainly growth in this niche of the bow market. It’s reflective, he says, of this interest in simpler things that’s “been echoing throughout our lives.”

There’s that, and there’s Katniss Everdeen, points out Dusty Ellis, manning the Striker Bows booth a few rows over. The Hunger Games franchise has done a lot to boost the longbow’s profile lately.

More from National Outdoor Show

—

For another look at the show, check out our story on duck calls.

“It’s a simple stick and string that will intrigue you, and mess with your mind to no end,” says Mike Vines, president of the Michigan Longbow Association, which is seeing membership growth “by leaps and bounds.”

“It’s about getting back to the basics. People are tired of having schedules,” says Vines. “You want to get away from that. You want to just drift back in time.”

When it comes to hunting, one of the attractions of bows in general is that they’re harder than using a hunting rifle. Even with a compound bow ”“ the kind with pulleys and sights and other modern-era upgrades, used by the large majority of bow hunters ”“ most hunters have to get within 20 to 30 yards of their targets. With a simpler, slower longbow, that distance gets shorter yet.

“I want to get in the animal’s danger zone,” says Vines, who killed a mule deer last fall from 13 feet away. “I want to be up close and personal with everything I hunt.”

In June, he’s going to Manitoba for his first bear hunt with a longbow.

Damian Ives makes longbows for G.I. Bow.

After a lifetime of shooting traditional bows wore out his arm, Terry Craig switched to a crossbow; the one he’s holding costs $2,699 ”“ a ‘Cadillac’ version.

The WishBow’n, a brand new crossbow/wrist-rocket hybrid that debuted at the Great American Outdoor Show.

A beginning archer takes aim at the Great American Outdoor Show.

At the other extreme of the bow world sits the crossbow, which has also enjoyed booming popularity over the last several years. Because shooting a crossbow doesn’t require drawing the bowstring, these are attractive to aging or beginning archers and anyone else who can’t draw a traditional bow. Terry Craig, down at the opposite end of the immense exhibition hall hawking crossbows for TenPoint Crossbow Technologies, is a case in point. After shooting vertical bows for decades, drawing and firing countless thousands of arrows, his arm wore out. Crossbows are his thing now; the top-of-the-line model at his booth comes with a $2,699 price tag.

The way a crossbow’s grips and sight mimic a rifle’s can make it something of a gateway device from firearms to archery for some hunters, says Matt Hershey of Kodabow, another vendor working the crossbow beat at the show. Whatever the reason, the crossbow sector has been growing quickly as well, and more and more states are opening their archery seasons to hunters using crossbows.

“At the end of the day, it’s all preference,” says Ellis, on diversity in bow design and technology. “The more the merrier, in my eyes.” (Not all hunters agree.)

Regardless of what kind of bow people are using, says J.R. Abscher, director of communications for the International Bowhunting Association, there are more and more people with bows out there. The hunting seasons are longer for bows, and they start earlier, allowing bow hunters to get out and enjoy a little more elbowroom in the woods. Bows are challenging, he continues, and people like challenges. And when you’ve got the bow bug ”“ which a great many people at the Great American Outdoor Show evidently have very badly ”“ there’s no shortage of bows to play with.

Bows fit into this simplicity thing going on in our culture now, Abscher agrees, but would expand that idea to encompass hunting in general.

“It’s become something that is fashionable, for lack of a better word, to shoot and prepare and utilize animals,” Abscher says.

And of course, no activity like this would be truly interesting without its oddball fringe, a space occupied at the Great American Outdoor Show by Tony Chirico and his brand new invention, the WishBow’n. A hybrid wrist-rocket and crossbow, the invention was inspired by an online video of some guy shooting an arrow out of an actual wrist-rocket that Chirico’s daughter showed him.

The spectacle planted a seed of inspiration in Chirico’s mind. He spent considerable time tinkering and refining the concept at his home in Suffolk, Virginia, and finalized the design last year. He hasn’t taken a deer yet with the WishBow’n, but it’s every bit capable of bringing one down.

What’s the takeaway from this new movement towards the past? For one, old certainly doesn’t mean obsolete. There’s more, though. Old doesn’t mean static; old doesn’t preclude new twists. Ives’ longbows are true throwbacks. Chirico’s WisBow’n is a brand new riff on an ancient theme. And like the longbows, the crossbows and pretty much everything else in the cavernous exhibit hall, the WishBow’n is, in Chirico’s words, attracting “a ton of interest.”