How did you get started making wood bows?

[Badger]

  I spent nearly everyday of my life hunting rabbits for about 4 years before I finally scored. I got impatient and stole one of my moms chickens and took him out in the field to hunt him. Poor chicken we must have shot him about 10 times with field points that would hardly penetrate. I was feeling so bad for the chicken I just wanted it to end and ended up ringing his neck.

[barebo]

In 1970 I got a Ben Pearson Colt and some cheap arrows. Shot recurves until Wing introduced the Impact compound. Got tired of cables and started to acquire some nice custom recurves.
Met an older gent at a 3-D shoot that had a stunning Osage longbow. I asked him where he bought it. He told me that he made it, and used pieces of broken light bulbs for final tiller.
I was so taken in by that few minute exchange that I decided I was going to make a bow.
I got a piece of ash from a local sawmill, and just started whacking away until I had the shape of a bow. I had Zero clue but it looked pretty much like a bow, so I went to the local archery shop and the owner gladly measured the length and sold me a string.
Got home and was really pumped to try my new creation. I actually got the string on it with a tremendous struggle - it was likely in the 80 -90# class but actually resembled a braced bow.
Stood in front of a mirror so proud and gave 'er a good yank.................SNAP!!!! The bottom limb came off just below the handle and whacked me in the belly and I had a bruise about 8" in diameter for a good long while. Great.
I had done some trading of older Bear bows with a Great guy and excellent bowyer named Val Sorrentino, and told him about my mishap. He told me to get the Trad Bowyers Bible.
That was it for me - the early bows were a bit rough but cast arrows, and the simple pleasure of being able to use my own hands to fashion wood into a viable weapon, keeps the fire burning. Since those early ones, I've made some fairly nice ones, and it makes you want to see how the next will turn out.
Making bows led me here to see and hear others experiences, and admire some amazing talent.

[osage outlaw]

I grew up with a compound bow in my hand.  I watched my Dad and my Mom kill deer with them in the early 80's-90's.  I kept shooting and hunting with a compound until around 10 years ago.  I got bored with it and wanted to find a longbow to shoot in the yard.  I looked at new bows and realized I couldn't afford one.  I found a guy on craigslist who said he could make me a bow.  After talking to him for a while he told me that you could make a bow out of osage.  That was good news to me because our property was covered with it.  That guy came and I cut him a load of osage logs in exchange for making me a bow.  While I was waiting I started doing some research.  I found Mickey Lotz's build-a-long online and followed it step by step on my first bow.  When I got the bow finished I sent a few carbon arrows out of it and was hooked even though it was a mess of a bow.  The next day I started on another one.  I still have my first bow.  I haven't shot it since that first evening when I finished it.

[BowEd]

Being a farm kid with 1 sister who leaves when 6 years old leaves a boy with few options to entertain himself with besides work/a dog/other critters/and the outdoors and shows on TV of the outdoors to dream about.So raising animals and the matter of life and death was just that.A part of life.A natural process.Being bit/bucked/stomped or butted by most every type of critter out there gave me a healthy respect for them.With those antics catching up with a person later on in life.
Hunting with a gun most my life and with partners that were dogs too gave me more of an appreciation of nature and the natural process too.Getting into muzzle loaders and rendezvousing as an adult swerved me to the more primitive aspects of hunting.
The fact that a person could go into the woods and retrieve materials for hunting with a bow and arrow and be successful just followed suit too,and the fact that I am just plain cheap....lol.
So in the spring of 2009 I decided to start making wooden bows.With the focus mostly being on useful function of everything.I wanted to see things work as they should.Whether it be for fun or more serious work.
The addiction of bow making is one like many hobbies that always leaves a person with more to prove to themselves.So I'd say it was the attraction of the outdoors that I find peaceful that brought me to the making of wooden bows.As just a part of the natural world.
I've never owned but 1 old old FG 40# bow and never owned or even shot a compound but can appreciate the sport of archerys' many aspects.Thanks to those who have I have more insight of the sport and the process of making bows and arrows.I still have my first self bow also.Made of osage and still shoots.

[George Tsoukalas]

I grew up on a farm in a small MA town. Circa 1957. Stringing small saplings with some string seemed natural enough. Arrows were smaller saplings fletched with chicken feathers with nails as points.  To a small boy the arrows flew so well!

I shot a Bear Fox until the mid 60's andwent to college.

My brother of eternal memory and I bought recurves long about '75.

I always wanted to build an all wooden bow and finally did after 3 years of trying (14 tries) long about 1992.

That bow was magic! I still have it.

Jawge

[Knoll]

  I spent nearly everyday of my life hunting rabbits for about 4 years before I finally scored. I got impatient and stole one of my moms chickens and took him out in the field to hunt him. Poor chicken we must have shot him about 10 times with field points that would hardly penetrate. I was feeling so bad for the chicken I just wanted it to end and ended up ringing his neck.

Badger ....  I was laughing so hard! Then read it to Carol ... and she was laughing harder!! Made my day.          

[Jim Davis]

Made a bow out of a one  inch sappling  when six years old or so. Green and wet, arrows the same , would go maybe 15 feet. Was interested in hunting trapping, fishing all my life.

Saw a copy of TBB Vol. 1 in a used book store and wondered if it was one of those hippie/back-to-the-land Firefox type books. Next visit to the store' I bought the book. That was in 1997. I have been making bows ever since.

But my interest is much more in shooting than in bow building. I make a new bow when I want to try something or teach someone or make a gift. Quit counting when I made my 100th bow about 2005 or so. First attempt broke because of a hidden defect. Have only had 5or 6 others break--dry fire, over draw' a few handle glue joint failures.

let's build a bow! Nah.a let's go stumping!!!

[bjrogg]

51 years ago my cousin found a arrow head when he was five years old picking stones with his dad. When his younger brother got older he became obsessed with looking for artifacts. He has a very nice  collection. A couple years ago my uncle passed away and my cousin who found the arrow head when he was five decided he was going to make a arrowhead for his dad's funeral. He brought some stone home with him and we sat down and tried to knap some very crude points. I had no idea what I was doing but somehow I just felt drawn to it. When my cousin went back home he left some stone with me and I started watching YouTube videos. It took a lot of time and I made a lot of gravel but I actually started to make some crude but usable points. Next I decided to make some very crude arrows. Of course the next step was to make a bow. Again I turned to YouTube and armed with just enough information to be dangerous I made my first selfbow. As I notched my crudely made stone point arrow on my hand made flimsh twist string drew my bow back and let my arrow go watching it spiral its way to somehow amazingly hit the 4x4 foam target I'd constructed my life was forever changed. I just really enjoy everything about this addiction. Most people think it's interesting but they wouldn't have the patience. To me it is therapeutic.
Bjrogg

[TimothyR]

In Ordered a hickory bow from a online seller,  ringing rock bows I think, and it broke the first time I pulled it back.  I couldn’t afford another one and they’d wouldn’t make me another one, so I said to my wife that I bet I ccould make a bow myself, and several broken bows later I was able to get them to bend right.  You haven’t been able to build anything in a year or so, but I’ve been getting the itch to get back on the bow bench.  It has been an interesting ride but it is a skill that you can carry with you always. I love it!

[Weylin]

When I was in my twenties my dad was helping to organize a primitive skills gathering on Lake Superior at the Bad River Reservation. My wife and I went up for a weekend. There was a man, Mark Lambert, who was teaching a bow building class. I knew that was what I wanted to do. I got a big fat hickory stave from him and went to town. The other people were already in the final tillering stages because we got there late. I hacked away at that thing till it was pitch dark and my hands were bleeding trying to catch up. I only got the bow to first brace and the tiller was off by the time the weekend was over. I sat on that bow for a while, too scared to work on it by myself. I read TBB vol. 1 which was information overload at that point. We moved out to Oregon a while later. I met Gordon Ferlitcsh here on PA and he invited me over. He helped me get further on my hickory bow and gave me a lot of good info. I knew from reading TBB that John Strunk lived in Tillamook. I booked a weekend with him, one on one, and I made a yew bow with him, start to finish in two days. We also got the hickory bow tillered and shooting. After that, nothing could stop me. I had the bug bad. My dad had cut several yew staves in Nor Cal about 30 years prior and never done anything with them. He gave them to me and I made a bow for him, a bow for my wife and a bow for me from those staves. I've been very fortunate to have so much hands on, expert help from the very beginning. PA has been a huge help too.

[chamookman]

I had been a Traditional Archer for a few Years, then I read a few Jay Massey books, and the seed was planted. Then I heard about a Guy in Flint by the name of Gary Davis, doing Selfbow classes in His Garage. Went to see what it was all about, made My first Bow and was hooked  .  Very fortunate to be able call Gary a Friend after all these Years - Bob.

[k-hat]

Well, for me as my son was getting older I thought it was time to start doing projects together.  Would've loved to put together a classic mustang or camaro, but I was to poor.  My Dad was a professional furniture restorer and a craftsman, so woodcraft was deeply ingrained in me, and I am a toxophile at heart.  Archery had also been a long interest of mine, like many others I had a fiberglass bow as a kid.  I was shooting arrows straight up into the air long before it became a thing in an Adam Sandler movie.     Somehow the two interests came together in my internet searches for father/son projects and I stumbled upon this dark mysterious underground community of bowyers.  What?!?!?! People still build wood bows the old way?!?!?!  I was hooked before I even got started. 

That was in November 2010.  Found Mickey Lotz's board bow build-along, got my son (and myself) a "primo" red oak board from the depot for Christmas, and we proceeded to build.  That board actually turned out to be the best board in the history of red-oak boards (density, ring orientation, etc) and I haven't found one as good since (also switched to staves, so I'm not looking anymore).  Both bows made it, but his was a little big for him, so dangit if I didn't "have" to make him another one a little more fitting 

I now have all of TBB series, plus a few more books, as well as Asbell's instinctive shooting book.  My son never took to the craft though, so I've been on my own, but loving every minute of it!!!  Don't get to do it nearly as much as I would like though.  I was starving for staves for a long time (until I realized it's ok to ask for free wood from those who have it growing), but now I have a literal "backlog" of wood in the garage my wife just loves to see

[mullet]

I started out when I was about 7 or 8 shooting those little $3 hickory bows with the two arrows with suction cups. It didn't take long for the rubber cups to come off and the sticks sharpened by rubbing them on the sidewalk. And then I was in the woods everyday hunting anything that moved. Never successful till in my early Teens with rabbits and squirrels with a 25# Pearson glass bow, still have it. Then owned a compound in the early eighties for a year and got the bug to build a wooden bow.

 Made the first one out of a hickory sapling and it shot real good till my Compound shooting Buddy pulled it back too far. After that I found Paleo Planet when it first started up and then migrated to Primitive Archer's site when it was in the fighting and arguing days. After that it was game on.

[DavidV]

At some point in my childhood the seed was planted in my brain that there are people out there making wood bows on their own. I think my dad told me a story about meeting a guy who made a bow out of hedgeapple. Well that seed grew into an obsession and around 15 or 16 I started eating up everything I could find on making a bow for myself, eventually finding Sam Harper's website. Told my parents I wanted tools for my birthday and built a red oak board bow with a surform rasp, a couple of 4" clamps, and a set of files. I haven't made a lot of bows recently between other projects and remodeling the house but I'll swing back into it in the future. It's what got me started working with my hands and away from the computer and TV.

[simson]

I came late to archery and bowery at the age of 48 while building toy-bows for my two sons. This was so much fun, that I decided to make another one for me.

Well, I got the virus.

To make it short, I begun excessively to make more and more bows, meanwhile several hundreds.