How can you tell if an old long bow was American made or made in England? thanks Don

Don, Unless one knows the provenance of the bow or it is marked I'd say no. Many of the early bowyers like James Duff as well as more recent bowyers like Don Adams, John Strunk, Jerry Welch etc have made some find English style longbows of yew( or Lemonwood etc) Bows that bend thru the handle and have the higher stacked "D" crossection rather than those with a slightly flattened round crossection with modest dips.. The 'american style wood longbow is more of the Chester Stevenson style as I have seen them..

The style itself doesn't really tell where they ere made.. There have been English longbows made by bowyers in the UK ( Like John Cave, Pip Bickerstaffe etc) that found their way into the hands of American archers..but shipping/customs make them more costly..and frankly..we have better yew wood available here in the US than England has had access to since the Mary Rose days( and THAT wood was imported from Italy and elsewhere..:)Jim

Interesting Jim thanks for sharring. ARVIN

Jim - I think you touched all the bases and especially the one marked "availability of wood." In the USA we have a wonderful supply of Cascade yew in Oregon and osage orange in other parts of the country, providing bowyers new and expert with the finest woods for the English and American style self longbows. We also have the ability to hunt with this effective and venrable weapon, whereas the Brits are sorely hampered with socialist laws.

None of this is to say that our British cousins are not as good bowyers when they have the best wood available. Some of them are true masters of the bowyer craft.

As to cross sectional shape, the Wales Warbows website has very interesting discussion of different cross sectional shapes from their research. They also have very interesting info about flemish style strings made from linen for heavyweight bows, but that is subject for another thread.

I just love English longbows!

"I just love English longbows!"

You and me both. They're so classy!

I have an English longbow that was made as a gift for me by a member of the guild in England. he had access to material that is very old. my bow is made of piquea with a hickory back. the brocade of the grip is from a coronation carriage. it is far different in construction to any copies I've seen that are made in the u.s.a.. I knew only one person on this side of the pond that had the certificate from the guild in England. roy day, of Canada, who made some of the most beautiful bows I have ever seen and shot.

Larry, do you have any pictures of that bow? It sounds magnificent, like a Sunday best bow. :)

Warbow Wales - That's the name of the website in Wales - very interesting stuff and some very serious traditional archers.

Larry - You've probably seen English longbows made by Don Adams, John Strunk and/or Jerry Welch. How is your bow different?

Most English bowyers will sign or stamp their mark on their bows. The main features that will identify an older English bow are the nocks, the cross sectional profile and the sculpture (or lack of it) of the handle section. As Jim quite rightly says, the quality of English Yew is generally very poor compared to West coast American or central European yew.

72" long 36#@28" Name stamped in bow J.H. Baker. American or made in England? Anyone have any idea's. thanks Don

The grip is wrapped in some type of velvety cloth.

The nocks at the end of the limbs are some type of metal.

Don ... any possibility of a close up picture of the nocks.

Here's some pictures of the nock's Phil.

Makers mark.

The bow is 33# my mistake.

I have never seen a Gerald welch longbow with a horn nock or without a shelf. the shelf thing is a big problem. a true English longbow has an arrow pass on both sides of the bow. not a shelf. ever.

larry - Thanks for the input. I have a Gerald Welch American style longbow and a Don Adams English longbow, both with leather shelves, but I realize that is not English standard.

Thanks Don ....

... OK, I'm going to stick my neck right out here, and proberbly make myself look stupid.

In your first photograph my immediate thought was that it's a bow made by English bowyer James Buchanan, which is why I asked for photographs of the nocks. Now that I've seen them they do look like Buchanan nocks (see attached picture)but nocks on English manufactured bows were almost always horn. During the latter part of the 19th century American archers were using English style longbows either imported from the UK or made by a growing group of american bowyers who copied english bow styles and designs. It's common knowledge that the Thompson brothers recieved and used bows from Buchanan and later from Duff. The nocks in your photograph look like cast aluminium which was becoming a popular but expensive material in the final decades of the 19th century.

So what do we have here? .... well Don, I think you have a late 19th early 20th century American made longbow with rudimentary cast aluminium nocks, made in the English style and influenced by the work of James Buchanan. If it is, then I think it's a very rare and precious item.

.... of course I could be completely wrong !!!!!

Tonto, The nocks are pretty classical in style..I don't think they are cast aluminum however. They are lead with antimony ( like the old printing press typset lettering stamps were made of)..It is hard and durable. The wood may be yew..but even for a 70+ long bow that's onlt 33# with no sapwood that'd be odd..

I still think the wood is Dagame( lemonwood)..or maybe Lancewood..they are pretty similar..Jim

Update .. I took the liberty of e-mailing some friends who have pretty comprehensive libraries. J.H. Baker doesn't seem to appear in any English references and there's no mention of Baker in Fred lakes Bibliography of Archery. I strongly suspect J.H.Baker is an American.

So Phil, what makes this bow special. Is that it was made by an American bowyer. So I guess this is a good one to hold on to? Thanks for your help. Very interesting stuff indeed. Don

Lead with antimony would be an idiotic material for nocks. It's many, many times heavier than aluminum and can only hurt performance. Are you sure, Dire Wolf? Maybe if they are lead nocks this wasn't meant to be shot but only displayed?

Phil- That bow in the picture. That James Buchannan made. Is that bow made of yew? I can see the tight grain lines. Don

CKeith, Years ago I had a lightweight yew ELB that had nocks very similar to the ones pictured in Tonto's old bow...They were lead..but harder than fishing weight leador wheel weight lead..More like the stuff they used to make the letters from for old time printing presses.. They were not as heavy as one might think..and that old bow was meant to shoot and had been used quite a bit..The old bow I had had the lead 'horn nocks' pinned onto the wood limb tips...

The old linotype was about 4% tin, 12% antimony and 84% lead..This made it far more durable than pure lead..Jim

Don ..Yes it's Yew, proberbly from Spain as the bow was made around the time Buchanan was advertising the fact he was importing Spanish Yew

Wow! I can't believe this bow is that old. I was thinking 1940's at the oldest. Sure would like to find out more about this J.H. Baker. To think that the Thompson brother's might have tried this bow out is just unbelievable. Thanks again Phil and Jim for your input. Don

I like the style of the horn tip in the last picture.

A traditional English bow will be stacked, the widest part of the bow at the arrow pass (no shelf.) It will be a straight taper down to the nocks, and the stack will be 3:1.

American bows are generally flatter and less rigidly stacked.

cool stuff

3:1? That's madness!

Aluminum is the third most abundant element in the Earth's crust, falling behind oxygen and silicon. It is the most abundant metal. It is somewhat surprising, then, that aluminum was not discovered until relatively late in human history. Aluminum occurs naturally only in compounds, never as a pure metal. Removing aluminum from its compounds is quite difficult. An inexpensive method for producing pure aluminum was not developed until 1886.

Read more: http://www.chemistryexplained.com/elements/A- C/Aluminum.html#ixzz2XBVSPHn1

I was curious if aluminum was even available when this bow might have been made, so I looked it up. I copied and posted my find because I think it is very informative/interesting ...just food for thought.

Yeah, it's traditionally been 2/3:1. Or .750:1. Modern ELBs are not stacked as high, more like .6:1.

The archery knowledge that some of the gentleman have on here is truly amazing. Thanks Phil and everyone for your input. Archery history very interesting stuff. Don

Very interesting thread! And I always thought aluminum was an alloy! Shows what I know! ;)

Don, there are certain threads that are a real pleasure to be part of .. and.. this is one of them. Although we haven't been able to she too much light on the work J.H.Baker we now have a new example of a bowyers work that can be the subject of research and investigation for future archery history buffs

so Don ... thanks for starting this thread .... the archery world is a little richer and a little wiser for it.

Phil

ttt

Beautiful old bows.

Here are some pics of a Roy Day bow I am lucky enough to have.

Don you have a PM

Still trying to find out about J.H. Baker long bows. Anyone have any information on this bow maker?

Picture of the tips.

Nope. Very well could be a garage bowyer, like most of us. It was quite common for any ol' hobby bowyer to have a stamp.

Just found this snippet.

"That is a very old bow! I don't know much about JH Baker, the info I have been able to gather indicates he was a maker of entry level target bows during the late 1800's. I can't be 100% sure from a few pics but I'm beginning to think you have got something special here. Note the small hole in the tip. Bowyers of the time used to drill holes like that in the tips to "reduce pneumatic pressure inside the bow" now of course we know differently. There is a J.H Baker sited in "the witchery of archery" (ca1878), "The theory and practice of archery" (ca 1867 by the famous world champion archery Horace Ford) I even found an add for his sporting goods store in "the daily globe"(St Paul Minnesota) from may 20, 1880. I too think a visit to trad gang or a local expert is in order. DO NOT string the bow or let anyone talk you into selling it till you have talked to 3 independent sources! Personally I'd be on the phone with the archery expert at the smithsonian, especially if I was as close as Jersey."

I thought the hole was for a "string keeper" ribbon, (I believe mentioned by Maurice Thompsons). Have never heard or read of the "pneumatic pressure" problem before!

It is. But I didn't want to make this guys comments part of the "who done it?" thread.

Pearl what is the guys name who wrote that snippet?

most of the old longbows i examined with metal nocks , the nocks were made of pewter

Don I found it on an old Alaskan hunting forum just searching Google. It was posted in 2010 by "Tony".

TTT

Here’s some more history in the old long bow EZarcher. Pear drums found some interesting stuff. Said J.H. Baker was mentioned in the book Witchery of archery. I have had no luck trying to find out about this bowyer. Except this little bit that Pearl Drums found. Even in Archery I guess some things will always remain a mystery. What’s the oldest archery museum in America?

If made in England with a 'velvety cloth' handle, I'd opine that might be a Victorian era or replica thereof build?

I too only go for ELBs with an arrow pass, never a shelf or leather wrapped handle for that matter. True ELBs or else ... go recurve, LOL!

If you have already registered, please

sign in now

For new registrations

Click Here