Latest / Salish Wolf / #94 Jay St. Charles on Project Quiver

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#94 Jay St. Charles on Project Quiver · Salish Wolf

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If you have not yet purchased your first edition copy of the
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forthcoming book Quiver The Art of Life Through Bow Craft, check
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And now on with the show. Welcome to Project Quiver, a
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father daughter journey across the globe to document the
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artistry and spirit of the world's finest traditional
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bowyers. I'm Todd, and Ella is my
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daughter. Together we've traveled to the
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workshops of master bow years, carving bows under their
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guidance, photographing their work in extraordinary detail,
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and preserving the stories behind one of humanity's oldest
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crafts. The result is Quiver, the Art of
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Life Through Bow Craft, a photographic and narrative
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exploration of traditional bow carving.
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This podcast shares stories and experiences of the remarkable
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individuals who are carrying forward the enduring legacy of
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the bow and arrow. The book is Quiver.
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The journey is Project Quiver. Welcome to the Salish Wolf
1:26
podcast. Sounds good.
1:30
Yeah. Thanks for joining me this
1:31
morning, Jay. Yeah.
1:32
No, I I'm happy to, happy to be here.
1:36
Yeah, it's great. Great to meet you.
1:37
How's the volume? Is the volume good?
1:40
Volume's good. Yeah.
1:41
Well, yeah, it works just fine. Great.
1:44
Where are you calling in from? I'm from in from Fall City, WA.
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It's a small community about 20 miles east of Seattle, sort of
1:56
in the Cascade foothills. It's a beautiful area.
2:02
What's that? That's a beautiful area.
2:05
It is pretty up here. Yeah, we're on, I've got a,
2:08
we're on 100 year old farmstead, that old house, old barn,
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really. Yeah, it's, it's, it's pleasant
2:20
enough here. So yeah.
2:22
How long have you? How long have you lived there?
2:25
Since 98. OK.
2:28
Yeah, yeah, my shop is my bow shop's been set up in my barn.
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I've got a oh, kind of a interconnected shop area with my
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some of my stuff's in a milk barn off to the side.
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And yeah, it's kind of a, it has to, it's always had a good feel
2:55
to it, to me. That's right.
2:59
Hey Jay, can you do me a favor and try turning your phone
3:01
horizontal so I can see if that? Gosh, yes.
3:05
Let's see if that helps with the image.
3:08
Let's see. No, that's not switching it.
3:15
OK, we'll just keep it vertical. OK, no problem.
3:19
So how big is the Homestead? We're on an acre and a third.
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It's not very big. We kind of got a little hilltop
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above the floodplain and Snoqualmie River Valley.
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And so it's kind of a Little River town and it it's located
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about two miles below a fall. So it was a this little town was
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established as the last freight stop before the before this big
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300 foot falls insects the river.
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So it's just what it was is a Little River landing, you know,
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and it, it kind of has that it's like 1 Main St. with a river on
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the other side, you know, so but.
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I was just in the Mountain Baker area a couple weeks ago.
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We were. We were there hiking in such a
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beautiful part of the world. Well, yeah, the Cascades are are
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are pretty cool. Yeah, I've been fortunate to
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spend a lot of time hiking around various areas.
4:32
Yeah, Baker a few times all. The way to the summit.
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Yeah, yeah, I was. I'm, I think I'm 5 for five.
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It's never, never denied. And they all, we just always
4:46
lucked out on the weather, you know?
4:48
So is that a multi day task? Yeah, it's kind of the fun way
4:53
to do it. You, you would coming from the
4:58
the southwest, I guess it is. There's a we, we when the roads
5:05
open, sometimes that doggone Rd. is just washed out.
5:07
I don't know what the status it is now, but we would establish a
5:13
camp in the edge of the lower glacier and camp through
5:16
overnight and then then head to the summit in the morning.
5:20
So it's, Yeah. And yeah, it's, it's, it used to
5:27
be a cabin there, which is long gone.
5:33
But yeah, it's it, it's a Baker's not a difficult climb.
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It has a it's, you know, it's got a glacier and it's got sink
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prevasses to mess with and all that.
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But yeah, the Cascades are, you know, they're, they're, I don't
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know, it's, it's kind of one of these big sprawling ranges that
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has a lot of glaciers and a lot of glaciated peaks and, and
6:04
yeah, fun place to get around in.
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So yeah. Does it require full
6:09
mountaineering gear to do Mount Baker?
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Yeah, Yeah, it does. And that you you do have to deal
6:16
with crevasses, so you have to deal with snow gear.
6:21
Yeah. Where did you get your
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experience for that? Well, I I got mine my
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specialized experience through an outfit called the
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Mountaineers. I I joined an outfit called the
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Tacoma Mountaineers. I was a little farther S than I
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am now and they had a climbing course.
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You could take a basic mountaineering course.
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And so I did that in 73 and and it's a lot of it's, they have
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rock climbing elements to it and all that.
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So and I, I did that 73. I got out of the service and
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wasn't quite ready to settle down.
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And so I, I, I started mountaineering and I did that
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for, I did a lot of mountaineering for about 3 or 4
7:24
years and, and then I got married and, and sort of slowed
7:31
down from that a bit. But yeah, I always, I've always
7:34
loved the outdoors and I still get, I get outdoors as much as I
7:38
can. So high Alpine country is kind
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of my one of my happy places, you know?
7:46
What other peaks have you summited?
7:49
Oh, I, well, I, I summited 73. I did all of the volcanoes,
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Rainier and those things. And then in 75, some of a group
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of us that most of us had met in the Tacoma Mountaineers, we had
8:04
planned, we we planned a trip to go to Mount McKinley.
8:07
She just called, backed us back to Mount McKinley again, I guess
8:11
now. So we did that in 75 and we had
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a fortunate trip. All of us summited.
8:17
And then I went back and 76 with tried to do a kind of a new
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route on the north side of it. And we didn't summit then, but
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had a bigger adventure. And let's see if I've climbed in
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the Rockies, done some climbing Yosemite a little, a little bit
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of hiking around the Tetons, but most of it in the Cascades.
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Most most experienced have been the Cascade.
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That's really cool. I spent some time in Denali at
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Mount McKinley years like decades ago, hiking through the
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hiking through the beautiful wilderness there.
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But never. I'm not a Mountaineer so never
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attempted a summit. Yeah, I know that one was we had
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Mount right here to train on. Of course you were, and we it
9:10
was. Took us three weeks to get to
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the summit and a day and a half to get back down.
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Were you on the mountain for three weeks?
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Yeah, yeah. We had some wet air issues, a
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couple of big storms and we had a party of party of eight people
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and everybody made the summit. And like the day I went up
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there, it was, it was almost windless, you know, there's just
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a light wind up there. It was about 15 below and we
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spent an hour up there at 20,000.
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So it's too late before another part of our party were up there
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in a complete Blizzard and didn't see anything, you know?
9:59
Oh, good for you. That's that's not for the faint
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of heart, that's for sure it. Was it was beautiful up there.
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It it, you know, just, it's like a level of things you just
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trained for it and it you can do it, you know, so.
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Yeah, so when did bow craft come into your life?
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Well, I, I guess I kind of came into this bow crafting from AI
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came actually from the commercial side.
10:28
My, my parents, my dad had, had kind of dreamed of being, he was
10:38
an early bow hunter. He was a bow hunter back in the
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30s in Washington state. And and he got into making bows
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and arrows at the time and had various small archery shops
10:52
around Seattle at inner late 30s, early 40s and in and then
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in 1949 found found my mom sometime around 1948 or so.
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And he bought some property in South of Seattle and he built a
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he and my father-in-law or his, his father-in-law, my granddad
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on my mom's dad built a shop, a house with a shop at the bottom
11:28
was like a, like a mom and pop archery shop.
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We had a, a bait archery shop in the basement house on top.
11:36
And, and, but that same time, this is about the time that,
11:42
that field archery, the National Field Archery Association was,
11:47
was going, oh, was growing and leaps and bounds around the
11:53
country and here in Washington state.
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We, we had, we didn't have Interstate 5, but we had, we
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had, we had a north to South highway.
12:05
And about every 20 miles there was an archery club really field
12:09
range. And there was a field range
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about 3, three miles from when they were the archery shop that
12:15
my mom and dad built. That was 1949.
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They built that and, and that's the year I arrived was 1949.
12:23
And so I kind of grew up with my, my brothers and sisters.
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We grew up working in the archery shop that was started
12:33
for after school job. And so it's in the archery shop
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we sold, you know, we had bows and arrows and, and we were kind
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of a hub in this kind of the center of the archery community
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in, in the 50s And, and that continued through the 60s.
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And so, yeah, archery was, was sort of in my roots.
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It, but it was, it was, I'd say it was a commercial sign because
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we, we made things and sold them.
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I always made, made things. And we, we didn't make our my
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dad had made a lot of bows, but he, he had made sort of as an
13:19
experiment. He, he, he was aware of what
13:22
Fred Bear was doing back in Michigan.
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In fact, he had Fred Bear in this.
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He was a famous bow hunter from, from the bear retreat companies
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still exist. We were warehouse for bear
13:37
retreat companies bows in the in the late 40s and early 50s.
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And my dad decided what he he been making boats out of U Wood
13:48
Whale bailing backings for a while.
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We had of course we had the Boeing Aircraft Company and they
13:58
had a surplus store. It sold all kinds of different
14:02
materials that Boeing had used and some of that lend itself to
14:06
BOE making. And so my dad experimented with
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having a factory for a while. He built a little factory to
14:17
make recurve bows in 1952 and got a good look at that.
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They made a recurve bow called the Thunderbird and and quickly
14:31
decided he wanted to sell somebody else's bows.
14:34
He is tired of making bows and or it was from a commercial
14:39
standpoint. He, he could see that the with
14:44
the having a, a group of people working for him to make bows,
14:50
he, he had no time to go bow hunting and doing things
14:54
outdoors that he wanted to do. You know, he turned into a
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entrepreneur and said, I'm an Archer.
15:03
He kind of wanted to be a, an Archer and he's a pretty good
15:05
salesman. So he decided to sell bear
15:08
stuffing, which we continue to do on our store.
15:11
So anyway, I, I in the I had gone in the service and came
15:20
back. I was in the service for four
15:22
years and came back out and thought I would.
15:28
I was going to school at the time, but I was also back
15:30
working as yard tree shopping bit and the compound Bowen had
15:36
entered the scene and in 73 the time was it was it was sort of
15:45
in its beginnings. They were every, we'd order a
15:49
compound bow from a a company and we never know it was in the
15:52
box when we get it because everything was, the customers
15:56
were all Guinea pigs and they were constantly experimenting
16:00
with something that you're making something it would hold
16:03
up. But there was also, as the
16:07
compound bow progressed and became, in fact, it became so
16:14
established that a, a big company like Bear Otree Company
16:18
that they in, in 7677, some right around there, they bundled
16:26
up all of their recurve bows and dumped them on the market.
16:30
They didn't think anybody was going to want them anymore.
16:34
They they just seem to make compound bows in the whole
16:37
industry. Wing archery company, everybody
16:40
just started making compound bows like man, which created an
16:44
interesting backlash from the archery community that played
16:52
some of them played briefly with these new compound bows and but
16:56
then they immediately missed their simple stick and string.
17:01
And so we got it, you know, we've got some of the people
17:06
just wanted to not, not do the compound bow anymore.
17:10
They wanted their simple bows back.
17:12
And, and it, it kind of triggered at that time, this
17:17
would have been by now we're into the 80's.
17:22
The, it, it wasn't a desire to go back to the recurve bows they
17:27
left behind to adopt the compound bows.
17:30
They wanted to go way back. They want to go farther back.
17:34
Let's shoot long bows was the thing.
17:38
And in that quickly morphed into a community by the late 90s, I
17:45
mean late 80s, mid 80s, actually even in the late 70s it started
17:53
all of a sudden everybody dug out there, you know, they
17:58
started started making wooden bows, which was not happening in
18:03
the 60s and it wasn't much happening in the early 70s.
18:07
But by the mid 70s, there is a community of guys in the
18:12
Northwest here and actually all around the country, they were
18:15
starting to make their own wooden bows again.
18:17
And my dad was, but who had done this back in the 30s and 40s.
18:23
He why did that light him up? And so that was that was kind of
18:37
my entry into the whole thing. It was, it was we had bought a
18:44
part of the somebody had started a bow making factory in Yakima
18:49
and Yakima, WA was kind of a a hug for bow making for a number
18:57
of decades. The Damon Howard Company was
19:00
located. So there are actually a lot of
19:03
people in Yakima that knew how to make fiberglass laminated
19:07
bows. Anyway, so how many started a
19:11
company in Yakima, a fresh start company, Savora Archery Company.
19:17
And it lasted for a while, but the owner had a had a heart
19:22
attack and, and passed away and, and, and then some years later,
19:29
the material that they had used to make bows, bow presses, bits
19:36
and pieces of that factory came up for sale.
19:38
And at that time, I'd been behind the counter of the store
19:42
for, oh, 15 years since I got out of the service.
19:47
And I was kind of curious that weird question came up.
19:51
Should, maybe we should make bows.
19:54
So I started making fiberglass laminated bows Immediately I
19:59
started wanting to make wood bows.
20:02
I, I guess I didn't want to be a factory either.
20:07
So there it's, it's this time now.
20:12
Now we're into the. Early 90s, maybe 1990s and this
20:21
is when they were in in the United States, there was Crystal
20:26
Meyers company had discovered that they they're they could
20:30
have some success treating cancer with the material called
20:34
Taxol, which came from yew trees.
20:38
And so we're in the 80s. We had my dad put together a
20:46
video actually in a book he wrote a book called Billets to
20:50
bow. It came out in the mid 80s and
20:52
we we went and kind of recreated what he had done back to the 30s
20:56
and 40s. We were able to go in the 80s
20:59
and harvest you and get permits and, and, and promote that idea
21:05
of things. We promoting the idea of people
21:08
making their own boats and didn't see really that as a
21:14
commercial thing, more of a just a just a great idea for archery,
21:19
you know, so but then the 90s came along, early 90s and
21:28
Bristol-Myers actually passed something called the EU Act of
21:33
1990 or 91, which gave them sole ownership of all you yew trees
21:42
on on federal lands in the country.
21:47
And it's since been rescinded. But that said, everything on its
21:52
ear and and we were in kind of a mad scramble to get our if they
22:01
what, what they're doing is stripping a bark off the yew
22:04
trees. Yeah.
22:05
And they weren't the wood at all.
22:08
And we were in kind of a scramble to try to salvage some
22:12
of the stuff that they were cutting.
22:14
They that point they cut during the 90s, they cut about 1/3 of
22:20
the whole yew resource, you know, Washington, Oregon and
22:25
wherever it was growing. But it it also made the federal,
22:32
you know, most of most yew trees grow on they grow on Oh, old
22:41
second growth, old growth, old second growth.
22:43
They like company of big Douglas firs and speeders and whatnot.
22:47
Yeah. And so you don't, you're not
22:51
going to find them just on people's, in people's yards.
22:54
They're they're, they're on land that belongs to somebody,
22:57
belongs to a timber company or belongs to the federal
23:00
government or belongs to the state.
23:03
In any case, you need permissions and permits to get
23:06
this U. And so since they so much would
23:10
have been cut all of a sudden, the Forest Service didn't want
23:13
to let loose of anymore once they were what had happened.
23:17
Finally with EU bark industry, Bristol-Myers discovered they
23:21
could actually extract taxol better from branches and
23:25
needles. And so now they have these
23:27
little well, it looks like Christmas tree farms, but it's U
23:31
farms. And they will just share these
23:37
little Christmas trees, these little yew trees.
23:39
And that's how they get there. So the trees in the forest are
23:42
now off the hook. But if, if you talk to a Forest
23:46
Service person about a Yew Tree, they kind of kind of roll their
23:49
eyes and remember what had happened before.
23:53
And difficult to get permits. It's, it's been done.
23:58
I've got it's it's always been a fight to get you with.
24:02
I've, I've always and I that's what I've primarily worked with
24:06
and bow making is you and it's just been kind of an ongoing
24:14
treasure hunt to for permits and finding you that I could access
24:21
and you know. Yeah, wow, it's quite a story
24:26
and you has suffered quite a number of attacks European you
24:31
from. Well, bow building.
24:33
You know, the English Longbow was so, so sought out that a lot
24:38
of the European U was destroyed, so much so that it's protected
24:42
in most countries now I believe in Europe.
24:45
And then, yeah, here in the Pacific Northwest, there's just
24:48
so much. Well now just logging in general
24:51
is destroying so much of the Yew Tree because it's it's not a
24:55
lumber wood, but as you said it grows in amidst lumber woods,
24:59
Douglas fir and cedar. And so when they cut those down,
25:02
they just cut EU down and leave it to rot.
25:06
It's usually in the way. Yeah, yeah.
25:09
And I was able to get a permit in Idaho.
25:16
It was a pulp wood sale that had U mixed in with it.
25:21
And a friend of mine found a friend that worked the, he's a
25:27
road surveyor for the Forest Service.
25:34
And we found some U on some state land in Idaho that
25:41
belonged to the one of the pulp companies in Idaho had a had a
25:49
permit to cut all the pulp wood. They're just going to clear cut
25:51
the whole darn thing. And, and there were three big
25:53
gullies that were full of U wood.
25:56
And usually the easiest thing for corporate America to say is
26:03
no, because it, it's pretty hard to get in trouble by saying no.
26:09
You know, if they if they've got a lease on some land and if they
26:13
let somebody else in there and mess around before they get in
26:16
there and it causes trouble. And whoever said yes on it gets
26:21
in trouble for with the company, you know, well, the what the
26:26
this is on state land and the the state land office told me
26:29
that will this guy that's going to do the permission for this,
26:33
that might give you permission. He's retiring and he doesn't
26:37
care. So I got a yes from some pulp
26:42
wood company to go in there and I spent three weeks over a
26:47
period of time with some friends in there and we tried to salvage
26:51
every all of you out of that one for the three bellies.
26:54
And that was that was in 2010. And that was the last time I did
26:58
a anything like that. It was this was in oh, kind of
27:07
North Central Idaho live near. They were Lewiston, ID and yeah.
27:17
And, and did you did you get dozens or hundreds of yew trees?
27:22
Oh, we got we got dozens because like most stands of you that
27:27
there aren't hundreds, There are only dozens.
27:29
I mean, there were hundreds of yew trees, but only dozens.
27:33
It would be suitable for making bows.
27:36
And it's it in all since, since we knew that this was all going
27:43
to be clear cut, everything is going to get knocked down.
27:46
We, we tried to cut every Yew Tree that looked like it had
27:49
some, some value to it because none of them are going to be
27:52
left standing. And so, and you know, a Yew Tree
27:58
can look you is really oh gosh, you know, I the the best
28:07
description for a Yew Tree that you can make self bows out of is
28:13
it is it needs to be stovepipe clean and with with no branches
28:20
on it. And you often grows with deep
28:26
fissures in the wood. It'll sprout branches wherever
28:30
the sun shines on it. And it's quite a salvage job
28:35
getting Beau wood out of out of the Yew Tree or out of EU
28:41
forest. I mean, you can I I there were
28:44
some perfect looking trees that we cut down that were hollow
28:48
inside. And of course the outside had
28:50
radial checks all around it. But when the bark still on it,
28:53
it looked perfect, you know, and it's a lot of disappointments,
28:57
but it's kind of like a treasure hunt.
28:59
So and it's and you is good. You would that'll make, they'll
29:08
make a bow. It's it's a real treasure, you
29:10
know it. And it does make it.
29:14
It makes terrific bows. In other words, it'll make a
29:20
that's one reason the English used it and, and wherever it was
29:25
grown. I mean, it was that old sea, the
29:28
Iceman that was up in the old stellar Alps.
29:30
You know, they found 5000 year old man.
29:33
He had a U bow. Yeah.
29:34
He did. Yeah, Yeah, you did.
29:36
And and so people discovered early on that it was, you know,
29:41
is useful for that they our coast Indians used.
29:45
You would for both. They made it almost the coast
29:50
Indians made a whole lot of things out of you and red cedar
29:55
and white cedar and that was just kind of their, those are
29:58
the woods they worked so and they used, they use you as their
30:04
hardwood. That was their hardest wood that
30:07
they commonly work with because all those 3 woods resisted rot
30:12
in the, you know, the wet country of Western Washington
30:16
and and going north into Canada and former Queen Charlotte
30:22
Islands. Yeah, all that business.
30:26
Now there is a lot of you wood up in Canada, up in British
30:30
Columbia. Yeah, I'm on.
30:32
I'm on Vancouver Island right now and well.
30:35
You are OK? Yeah.
30:36
You took a classroom. Did you take a classroom?
30:38
Somebody up there at Beek Raven? Raven Beek.
30:42
Nature works. Yeah.
30:42
So Jamie. Jamie McDonald.
30:45
Was. Was my first teacher and he I
30:48
bought, I bought my very first bow off of him, which was an
30:51
English Longbow of course with made of Pacific U.
30:54
And then after, after I got that bow, I just became so fascinated
30:58
with it. So I ended up carving well, I've
31:01
carved 4 bows now with Jamie. Yeah, yeah, I know that.
31:06
I've, I've never met him, but I just sound like a terrific
31:09
resource. He was what he's been doing up
31:12
there. Yeah, well, he's an incredible
31:14
bow. You're in.
31:14
He's in a place called Powell River.
31:17
And the deforestation, the deforestation there is just
31:21
crazy. It's they are taking down
31:24
hectare after hectare of land and this is some of the densest
31:28
forests of Pacific ewe in the world.
31:31
So he he took me and my my son for a drive through the forest
31:35
and every 5th or 6th tree was a Yew Tree.
31:38
But the the logging industry is just wiping out entire
31:43
mountainside. So he's got a massive stash of,
31:47
of eustaves 7 years worth. But it's, it's really sad to see
31:54
what's happening because as I said earlier, and as you alluded
31:58
to, it's it's a useless wood in the logging industry.
32:00
So they're just cutting it down and leaving it to rot.
32:05
Well, I, I'm, I'm glad he's he's getting to you and somebody
32:12
needs to to that stuff. And yeah, so that's in there
32:18
Vancouver Island. I'm not.
32:20
I haven't spent a lot of time I affected and more hardly spend
32:24
any time on Vancouver at all. But they've got that's some
32:29
Vancouver Islands still in British Columbia in general
32:34
still compared to Washington state, compared to down here.
32:36
It's pretty wild country up there.
32:38
Yeah, it is. Now the, the easily accessible
32:42
timber that grows along the shores of the various inlets
32:45
and, and waterways up there that they can get on.
32:49
I know they've been knocking it down for years and years.
32:52
And they're doing that. What we did down here 100 years
32:56
ago. They, we just took, they just
32:58
took everything. You know, there was where I'm at
33:04
right now. This was, this was an old growth
33:09
forest years ago. And now they've it's all
33:16
farmland and and and whatnot. Jay, can you hear me?
33:22
Because you're you're breaking up quite a bit.
33:24
Oh gosh, that sounds good. Is that better back now?
33:27
OK, I I've got to do a better job now.
33:29
It's still still breaking up. Not really getting clear clear
33:39
words from you. It's just.
33:41
OK. OK, that sounds a little better.
33:44
Maybe I can talk directly into this phone here that sounds.
33:47
No, it was the signal that was happening.
33:50
You were sounding like you were a tin man instead of a human.
33:54
Oh, OK. Can you maybe back up a minute?
33:59
You were talking about the dent you on Vancouver Island and you
34:05
haven't spent much time here. Well, yeah, there's I, I guess
34:09
what I'm saying it's, it's British Columbia, Med Cooper
34:13
Island, still a lot of wild country up there.
34:16
I, I don't know, I have no idea how, what the extent of the
34:20
logging has been. But I think if you get a little
34:23
farther into the interior, away from the away from the water,
34:28
away from the easily accessible logs there, there, there must
34:33
still be quite a bit of you up there just because of the, the
34:38
general size of there's a lot of forest, you know, I mean,
34:42
British Columbia, Yeah, British Columbia's, I think their
34:47
forestry is their largest industry up there, even though
34:51
it's on fire every year. You know, we have we have an old
34:57
area and can you hear me now? Perfectly OK.
35:01
There's West east of me toward the Cascades Snoqualmie River.
35:09
There's a middle fork, there's three forks of the Snoqualmie
35:13
River. There's a subsidiary river
35:16
called the Pratt River that takes off further east.
35:19
And there's no, there's no Bridger thing it we can't you
35:24
can't access the Pratt River by Rd.
35:28
But there was an old logging outfit back in there, probably
35:33
as late as the 40s. But you can wait across the
35:37
river and across the river or, or is an old growth forest that
35:42
was taken down and there's gigantic stumps of huge fir
35:47
trees and cedar trees that are still there.
35:52
And I mean, it's like a, it's like a logging museum just
35:56
across the river. We, we call this a Jurassic
35:59
Pratt because of see, there's elk over there too.
36:05
So, you know, you can still see what used to be around here if
36:09
you look, you know. Yeah, it'd be great to go back
36:14
and in time and see some of these massive stands.
36:17
We have a few old growth forests left here on Vancouver Island,
36:20
but not many. Yeah, yeah, I'm sure.
36:25
Well, anyway that, that's, that was my start in making bows.
36:29
One one of the things I discovered when I was making
36:32
bows, I started working with you and the I I was making some
36:38
hobby bows back in the late 70s, but I then I started making a
36:42
lot of bows. Actually, I was making bows, you
36:45
bows and selling them in the store You'd have in our archery
36:54
shop. I, I made bows and we sold my
36:56
bows in the store as well as bears.
37:00
You know, we had, we always, even though the compound bow had
37:04
had taken over the industry, about half our store was
37:08
recurves and long bows. We always sold compound bows to
37:12
it. I was, I worked on a compound
37:15
bows. It was like working in a lawn
37:18
mower shop, you know, small parts, small parts of panic, you
37:23
know, and, but the, what I had noticed is selling wood bows.
37:32
There were a lot of people that wanted to know how to make a
37:34
wood bow. And so I, I got the idea that I
37:39
could do some classes sort of like Ravenbeak showing up in
37:43
Canada. This was about this, I hadn't
37:46
heard of him. I don't think he'd heard of me.
37:47
But we're, this was in the early 90s, I started offering bow
37:52
making classes. And so I'd bring groups of three
37:57
or four people and we'd make a bow.
37:59
And, and I discovered early on that it was really important
38:04
when I did a class is that everybody left with a completely
38:07
finished bow. If I sent him home with a
38:10
parsley finished bow, it stayed that way to say so we would
38:16
completely finish bowls. And then I, when I did that
38:21
through the 90s and, and that was a lot of fun.
38:27
And then when I found this place here in Fall City in, in 98,
38:33
it's a big barn whatnot, I started, I all of a sudden had
38:38
more room in a in a much better place to work than I had at the
38:43
archery shop. And I know this is probably the
38:46
best, worst video you had in a lot of these things.
38:50
That's all right. It's pretty horrible.
38:52
So anyway, the so I did the did a lot of that and if if a guy
39:02
wants to there, there are some fabulous bow makers these days
39:08
that are real artists and. Absolutely.
39:11
And people that, and they offer their bows for sale and some of
39:16
them do. And you know, people ought to
39:22
buy some of those bows from. And if, if they're going to make
39:25
bows, they ought to have a really good example around that
39:30
they can shoot and good working bows.
39:32
And that if it's a bow like that can kind of act as a muse for to
39:38
get them to make more projects. And so they should patronize
39:46
those people that are those artists that are making these
39:49
things. But if a guy is going to wants
39:53
to have a career shooting lots of arrows out of wooden bows,
39:59
they they need to make their own bows.
40:03
So that they can, What's unique about a wooden bow as opposed to
40:09
a bow made out of fiberglass or or whatever?
40:13
It's a wood. Bows are not a forever bow.
40:17
They have a life. You don't know how long that
40:20
life's going to be. They'll all wear out eventually.
40:27
It's in fact, that can be kind of a person selling bows,
40:32
selling wooden bows. We, we kind of have a target
40:36
Walmart mentality from a consumer standpoint.
40:40
If if you, if you put a a year guarantee on a wooden bow, there
40:45
are a few customers that'll try that wear that bow out in here.
40:49
In theory, you have to make them a new one.
40:52
Just kind of it's it's being the selling archery equipment is a
40:57
whole other thing. It, it's, I know I, I had a
41:03
fellow come by years ago that just visited my shop.
41:07
He was going to, he wanted to see about making bows
41:10
commercially. He thought he'd make bows and
41:13
sell them. So he came by and he and he
41:16
looked around my rustic shop, which is really rustic.
41:18
I mean, it looks like 1/2 crossed between a junk heap and
41:22
a museum. And I, I wish I had you out
41:25
there right now, but I don't have Wi-Fi out there.
41:27
It's even worse than my telephone actually.
41:29
I could probably go out there with my phone.
41:31
It would probably work actually as I think of it.
41:34
But he, he said if you can make bows in this place.
41:40
So I know I can make bows. So he went and built himself a
41:45
state-of-the-art shop. And I talked to him a couple
41:47
years later, I saw he was making bows and advertising and then he
41:51
and then he disappeared. And I and I, I talked to him
41:56
later, he says, yeah, I, I made lots of good bows.
42:00
But how do you put up with these crazy Archers, you know, your
42:05
customers and, and I, you know, I said, well, Gee, I've been
42:09
doing that all my life. You know, they're, they're my
42:11
friends, you know, so no problem, no problem.
42:14
You just have to, you know, the archery community is, is a very
42:19
singular group of people. They they're almost contrarians
42:23
to some degree, and if you they're, I mean from a practical
42:31
standpoint, commercial standpoint, nobody needs a bow
42:35
and arrow and they might need a garden rake or a lawn mower with
42:38
no need a so it's they're pure fun.
42:42
Archer tackle is just, I mean it, it offers the Archer a lot
42:47
of viable things, but it's just a, it's a joy element.
42:54
And so I think that's we, we had the family archery store
43:01
operating from 1949 to 2006 where we finally closed it.
43:08
And we closed it partly because somebody wanted to redevelop the
43:11
land. It was on it.
43:12
And my brothers and sisters and I and my dad was still around at
43:16
the time. He, we all kind of dreamed of
43:20
having our own businesses and maybe see what that was like.
43:23
And I wish we still had the place because it was, it was, it
43:29
was kind of a hub of archery activity for the, for the
43:33
region. And, you know, sometimes you
43:36
don't know what you got till it's gone.
43:38
You know, that's kind of what that was like.
43:41
I I, I like what I have here right now, but that was its own
43:47
special thing. And you know, it was all about
43:49
The Archers and The Archers back then, back before, oh, back when
43:59
it was recurves, the long bows and most of the oh, the, The
44:08
Archers that the guys that went bow hunting and The Archers that
44:11
were Archers, they were like I say, they're kind of a singular
44:14
community. They, they, we had a lot of
44:19
Archers that did it for, for their whole lives.
44:23
You know, I knew people that had been Archers for 70 years and
44:28
stuck with it and identified as Archers and, or bow hunters or
44:34
whatever. And so it's, you know, it's, you
44:40
know, it's own side community and it's different today.
44:47
It's still everything changes, but it's different too.
44:51
So I, I, I, it looks like the, the, the wooden bow making
44:59
community is, is pretty much alive and well.
45:03
I mean, there's. With I think so.
45:05
Social with social media that we have right now where people can
45:10
make something and then share it online immediately, even in a
45:14
video boxer's new bow makers all over the place.
45:22
It seems like the and the I, I guess if I were to give anybody
45:36
advice on getting started making successful bows, First off, you,
45:45
you have to be ready to throw any project over your shoulder.
45:49
And now look back, you know, if a bow blows up or breaks, you
45:53
can, you can learn from it, but don't don't stress out over if
45:58
that happens. Trees keep growing and they keep
46:03
making more wood. So that's a good thing.
46:06
And, and if one of the things that got me over the hump as far
46:14
as trying to figure out whether a piece of wood was bending
46:18
correctly or not was I, I started working with smaller
46:25
pieces of wood. And instead of trying to make
46:29
every bow I made into a hunting bow, you know, it's my goal with
46:33
maybe to make a 50 LB bow or something, or a 70 LB bow or
46:38
something. You know, that's, that's kind of
46:40
a tall order concern. If you're going to make a, a 50
46:44
LB bow, first you got to make about a, a 70 LB bow to turn it
46:49
into a 50 LB bow. That's a lot of work.
46:53
I mean, it's physically work. And, but there's a lot of scant
46:59
pieces of wood that won't make a £50 or a piece of wood that has
47:04
something wrong with it. And if you, I think it was,
47:12
maybe it was, did you have a, you have a piece of view that
47:15
you you made? It's got a, it's got a big hole
47:18
in the middle of it. Yeah, it had three large knots
47:21
and one of them, one of them is right in the handle section.
47:24
Oh, yeah, spectacular. Yeah, the.
47:29
So if you, if you can work with some really crazy wood and make
47:34
some really light bows, like the thing about making small bows,
47:38
you could, there's a whole army of kids out there that all need
47:42
to have a bow. So if you make some 20 LB bows,
47:46
you're not going to be, maybe it's not what you wanted or 15
47:50
LB bows or whatever. But you can learn from every one
47:54
of those little bows and they're actually to make a good bending
47:59
20 LB bow is maybe more difficult than making a good
48:02
bending 50 LB bow. You just don't have much wood
48:04
there. Every, every little scrap you
48:07
take off makes a huge difference.
48:10
But I, I, I, when I was trying to learn to tell her bone, I had
48:15
my dad hand, you know, he made bows and he'd look at him.
48:18
But I, I had to, I had to train my own eye to see it myself.
48:23
And once I had built it, I started working with this scant
48:29
wood and playing with little bows.
48:30
And then I, after a while, I went back and cleaned up all my
48:35
old problems. And I maybe most bow makers do
48:42
I, I have probably about 20 bows or more going at once.
48:47
Wow. They're just, and some of them I
48:51
might not come back to you for a while.
48:53
I don't think most Bowers have that many.
48:56
Maybe not, I might not come back to one for years, you know, and
49:01
I it whatever reason I lost interest in it or I found
49:04
something, a new shiny piece of wood that I wanted to work with
49:08
and I put it in the corner. But or I had some problem.
49:12
You know, if you know, you're like, you're working in your bow
49:15
as you've got, you're working on a bow and it's just not seeing
49:21
it quite. And you put, you put it to
49:25
that's the time to quit. And then you put it to bed for a
49:28
day or so and you go back to it with fresh eyes.
49:32
And boy, why didn't I see that before?
49:35
That's a series of little epiphanies that happen, which
49:40
are all little sparks of joy. You know, when you get when you,
49:43
when you discover some new way of looking at a piece of wood
49:48
and, or you get into a piece of wood and you know there's
49:54
something bad going on in it. And but then you think of how to
49:59
how to work your way around it. Like that bow you had with all
50:02
the knots in it. You know that's that's but that
50:08
you end up with a bow for the ages, you know when you get done
50:11
so. Yeah.
50:13
They don't all have to be perfect, perfectly good
50:17
shooting. I mean they a bow can be many
50:19
different things. They all shoot arrows, but that
50:23
would be the bow that I'd probably choose to shoot the
50:26
Olympics with or something, you know?
50:29
So by the sounds of it, with all these bows on the go, you're no
50:33
longer making bows to produce bows.
50:36
It sounds like maybe you're making bows simply for the love
50:39
of making bows. Is that accurate?
50:42
Well, that's, that's kind of what I, that's kind of what I've
50:44
always done it, you know, I've made it, I've made lots of bows
50:48
to sell and I, it's, it gives me, if I can sell both an excuse
50:53
to, you know, pretty soon you can't, can't walk around your
50:57
shop because there's too many bows in the way, you know, So,
51:01
no, it's good to sell them and I could get more material and make
51:04
more bows, but it's not I, there is a, when I first started
51:12
making bows in the late 80s, I, when I, I started time with the
51:17
idea of making both the resin just selling bows in our archery
51:21
shop, making bows and selling them.
51:25
There's an American bow maker by the name of G Fred Asbell, who,
51:30
who had a bow making company called the Bighorn Company.
51:33
And I, we'd known Fred, I'd known Fred from bow hunting
51:37
circles for a few years, you know, and when he, when he, when
51:44
the different Archers came to Seattle, they had always just
51:47
had our archery shop. So Fred would always stop by and
51:52
he says he told me, well see, you want to make bows, huh?
51:55
You're going to make bows. He says.
51:58
You know, the best favor a guy could do to a guy that has a bow
52:06
making business, the best favor you could do him is burn his
52:10
little shop down. You know, and he is right.
52:16
It's not a, it's not a good way if, if somebody thinks you're
52:19
going to make money, there's a lot better ways to make money.
52:23
And when I started making bows, when I started working on bows,
52:28
I was probably about 40 years old.
52:32
And I quickly realized that actually, and I, I'd done a lot
52:36
of, you know, I'd worked for Boeing and I was in the Coast
52:40
Guard for four years and I, I'd worked in an archery shop for,
52:44
you know, 15 years before that and bow making as the hardest
52:50
work I had ever done. But I liked it.
52:55
That was, you know, my big impression, like making things.
53:01
So yeah, I always made, I'd always made things.
53:05
But but the bow making was kind of hit all my buttons, you know
53:11
so. I want to go back, you mentioned
53:14
in 49 the shop opened up and you guys were selling those.
53:18
Were those at that point in time had the fiberglass bow become
53:22
fully established and is. Yes, it had.
53:26
Yes it had. It was.
53:27
It was. That was the time of the very
53:31
early fiberglass bows and but fiberglass by the late 40s had
53:37
taken over as the material to make both out of they were bows
53:41
made out of aluminum at the time too.
53:43
And there was experimenting with aluminum laminations.
53:48
There's a lot of blowing surplus had train loads of aluminum then
53:53
we're not going to become bombers for World War 2 anymore.
53:56
So but yeah, it had taken over. So we, we had, we did sell
54:02
wooden bows per SE in the by the in 1949.
54:09
In fact, there one of the sometime in the 60s, there's a
54:14
bow maker by the name of Gilman Teasey.
54:19
He's from bow is Oregon bow maker made a lot of bows, made a
54:27
lot of U bows, made bows back in the 30s.
54:30
He was a national archery champion in the the 1930s.
54:34
He came by with a station wagon full of this had been this had
54:39
been in the 1960s late 60s. I remember having a station
54:44
wagon full of Osage and U billets and staves that he had
54:51
no market for. We, we bought the whole load
54:54
from him for about 5 bucks a piece.
54:57
I think because he didn't, they were taking up space at the time
55:02
he was making, he'd gone into making gun stock planks and
55:07
things like that. And then these are in his way.
55:10
And that's where things were then.
55:13
Nobody was nobody. In fact, when we, I started
55:18
making U bows in the 70s, playing with it, you know, dad
55:22
was interested, but there was no community of people doing it.
55:27
And it looked kind of like a waste of time because he kind of
55:30
turned his back on that stuff. And we had a bunch of old
55:33
magazines from the 30s and 40s that were sitting in some moldy
55:39
cabinets somewhere. My brother noticed those and
55:42
rescued him. And that all that stuff was kind
55:47
of the start of we had a museum and we, we built an extension on
55:52
to their archery shop in the 80s.
55:55
And we had a museum and my brother, my brother used to work
56:05
in the archery shop, but we mostly called him the curator
56:09
because all you saw on the phone collecting stuff we had, we had
56:14
a quite an incredible collection of bows, North American bows
56:21
that we built in the 20s and 30s, some old English bows, all
56:27
wooden, wooden bow stuff that. And then we, we collected some
56:31
fiberglass bows too. But the, the core of our place
56:35
was broad heads and old arrows and old boats.
56:38
And so that, and that was really, that was a lot of fun
56:46
having that collection there, right?
56:48
That collection. Now it's in the hands of the
56:52
Pope and Young Club, and it's in a limestone cave in Missouri.
57:01
And it's it, it's in the hands actually, of the Bass Pro
57:07
Company. Really.
57:09
Yeah, yeah. They've got their at their
57:12
flagship store. They've got this big underground
57:16
storage facility and it's. And nobody's looking at it.
57:20
It's all down there right now. And hopefully they'll build
57:22
something and the Archery Hall of Fame is there and it's it's
57:27
on display, but they don't have space for all this stuff.
57:31
But yeah, in there, part of that collection is almost every
57:36
periodical and book that's been published in North America and
57:40
archery and bow making and all that.
57:44
Yeah. It's kind of like a.
57:45
Do they have any existing museum there right now or this is
57:48
something that they need? No, not not.
57:51
They have the archery Hall of Fame, but there's no, there's no
57:54
access to that stuff right now. There's individuals around the
57:57
country that have their own private museums, like Mars is a
58:01
private museum. If I I don't think he'd might be
58:05
mentioning it, but Jean Helen named Jean Hopkins in Indiana
58:11
has has quite a collection in his home and and Archers come
58:16
and visit him from time to time and there's other folks like him
58:20
around the countries and that that have private collections
58:24
or. Would these more be based on the
58:28
fiberglass bows since kind of the late 40s and on or do they
58:32
have a lot of primitive stuff as well?
58:34
It's a combination of, of stuff he has, he has Saxon Pope or
58:41
young bows. We, we used to have, you know,
58:44
these are bows from the 20s. And, and I have bows here like I
58:51
have, I don't have a museum. I have, I have kind of just a
58:55
big pile of stuff in my, in my shop.
58:58
But I have, the core of what I collect is I have, I have one
59:04
fiberglass bow that was, and I have some of my dad's
59:10
Thunderbird recurves. And, but everything else that I
59:15
have here is older stuff. And that's, that's the stuff
59:20
that really speaks to me. You know, it was, it's a, it was
59:25
from my standpoint, my outlook, which is really not the most
59:32
practical one, But I, I look at what the guys were doing bow
59:36
hunting, say back in the 30s and, and I don't think somebody
59:45
was coming to me that they were, they look at this old stuff and
59:48
they'd think, boy, look how far we've come.
59:51
And you know, looking at the very modern tackle, the, the
59:57
compound bows, everything and it all works great.
1:00:01
Bow hunting is its own thing and and it's really is standing on
1:00:05
its own hind legs and whatnot, but there's still there's a
1:00:09
community inside that that shoots long bows and recurbs.
1:00:14
And some of them shoot wooden bows and some of them make all
1:00:19
their own stuff and that's still around too.
1:00:22
It's it's really a, a, a broad community.
1:00:27
But I, I as far as with my story about how far we've come to my
1:00:36
ass, am I thinking we haven't we haven't gone anywhere.
1:00:39
We're those guys back in the 30s already had it all figured out?
1:00:43
Yeah. Well, he can say that back in
1:00:47
back in Etsy's day too. I mean these exactly.
1:00:50
Etsy had it all figured out. Yeah, the the Danish bowls that
1:00:54
are 910 thousand years old, I mean, these are well, not quite
1:00:58
9000 I guess, but some of those decisions just haven't changed.
1:01:02
And I think Chuck Loffler was telling me who's who does flight
1:01:08
shooting in Utah and makes beautiful replica bows.
1:01:10
But the key was was raving about the Home Guard design.
1:01:14
And it's an incredible design that still sets records on
1:01:17
flight shooting. Yeah, yeah.
1:01:21
If they're, if you look at what how they're built and you know
1:01:25
what a bow is supposed to do and how make how a piece of wood
1:01:29
bends and all that, then it all makes sense.
1:01:32
And yeah, exactly, yeah. Archery you all around the
1:01:39
world. Most cultures have some some
1:01:45
archery component too. Yeah, absolutely.
1:01:48
And, and all those cultures, their bows, their bows in their
1:01:53
archery methods differ wildly. I mean, they, but, but they all
1:01:59
get what they were looking at and they all shot arrows and so
1:02:06
there's certainly no one way to do anything.
1:02:08
Yeah, yeah, it's, it's, yeah, it's, it's, I think that's a
1:02:16
better way to look at it, but. I like what you said earlier
1:02:19
about no one needs a bow anymore.
1:02:22
It was something that we needed for survival, but no one needs a
1:02:25
bow anymore. And yet the bow and arrow,
1:02:28
especially the primitive bow and arrow, the way it's been around
1:02:32
for nearly 10,000 years, if not more, we still there's so much
1:02:38
reverence for that bow and these primitive bows, which they, they
1:02:43
could have been made obsolete long ago.
1:02:46
They they really. Oh yeah, every, you know, like,
1:02:49
yeah, they could have been. They on the the other flip side
1:02:53
of that is that from an archery standpoint, everybody needs a
1:02:58
bow. Yeah, exactly.
1:02:59
They just don't know it yet. They don't know if they need a
1:03:02
bow unless they if you what I've been making a lot of and I make
1:03:08
bows these days to please myself as much as anything.
1:03:13
And I I make what pleases me and I hope somebody wants 1, you
1:03:16
know, so I can make more. But I've been making a whole lot
1:03:19
of adult sized light draw weight bows I make from bows from 15
1:03:26
lbs up through mid 20 lbs. And then what they are is kind
1:03:32
of like backyard bows, you know? Yeah.
1:03:35
And almost everybody that's out there has had some kind of
1:03:40
archery experience it, but half of it's been a bad experience.
1:03:45
You know, it hits your arm or the bow is too heavy.
1:03:48
And the person that was shooting, I'm just wanted to
1:03:52
show them how good they were and they didn't really want to, you
1:03:54
know, that kind of thing. And and the.
1:03:57
So I've had a lot of fun making these and I, you know, everybody
1:04:01
needs a 15 LB bow to if, if you, what happens with these
1:04:06
lightweight bows? You put them in the hands of a
1:04:09
new Archer and turn them loose with some arrows and you can't
1:04:14
get the bow back from her again because they, you can take a
1:04:18
light bow like that and shoot it all day if you want.
1:04:22
Your fingers don't even get sore, but the arrow goes down
1:04:25
range, you know, same way. And it's the same challenge to
1:04:29
hit something. So that's what I've been having
1:04:32
fun making lately. And these are fiberglass
1:04:34
laminated for the most part. I mean, that's OK.
1:04:37
They're forever bows. You know, I'm going to and, but
1:04:41
I, but I put as much care into them as I put into any bow.
1:04:45
And so they're, they're, I figure if the person learns to
1:04:49
shoot on something that's beautiful.
1:04:51
I remember that too. You know that a bow is a, it's
1:04:56
kind of like a musical instrument, you know, it's, it's
1:04:59
a performance tool. You have to, it's supposed to do
1:05:02
something, you know, and then have to do much, but it has to
1:05:08
do it the same way every time. And hopefully it stays in one
1:05:12
piece for a while. But these, you know, I'm making
1:05:15
bows are easy for for me to make right now.
1:05:17
And I've made a lot of lightweight all, all wood bows
1:05:21
too over the years And I so yeah, are you still had 20 bows
1:05:29
coming along, you know? Are you still making primitive
1:05:32
self bows? All wood bows are mostly yeah.
1:05:34
I have I have various projects in in the corners here and
1:05:38
there. You know, I'll get out work on
1:05:41
you know, I, I, I, I foster the wood that I have.
1:05:46
You know that when I find a piece of wood that'll make a
1:05:49
self bow, I certainly don't make a laminated, you know, I won't
1:05:53
chop it up into lamination. So yeah, I'll, I'll, I'll use
1:05:57
it. So now I'm still doing some
1:05:59
informal teaching here, you know?
1:06:03
Other other than you would what what what has really fascinated
1:06:08
you over the years or have you enjoyed working with?
1:06:12
Well, I, I almost all my home making has been with either you
1:06:19
or Osage. I've made quite an upper Osage
1:06:22
bows and and I've made some vine Maple bows and all three of
1:06:29
those woods, you know, we'll make a pretty good bow.
1:06:36
The vine Maple just aren't as pretty, you know, maybe, but but
1:06:43
that's about it. I well, I've played with I've
1:06:46
I've, I've made bows out of other woods, but those those
1:06:51
woods are so lend themselves so well to making a good bow that I
1:06:59
just haven't really been intrigued by by using other
1:07:03
woods. And I've I've used bamboo
1:07:06
backing on E pay and I've done Hickory backing on bows and and
1:07:14
made laminated bows, wooden bows out of multiple laminations of E
1:07:20
pay and U and bamboo and whatnot.
1:07:23
I made a whole scan of kids bows with we had a bamboo outfit near
1:07:31
nearby here that I bought a whole pile of tonk and cane
1:07:35
while I was available And I, I made I, I had it.
1:07:42
There's a school system here that this school system called
1:07:46
the Waldorf school. Yeah, it's around the country in
1:07:50
the, in, in the Waldorf schools in the northwest here in 6th
1:07:54
grade, they, they take up archery.
1:07:57
So and I one of my one of those games and movement teachers, as
1:08:03
they call them. I thought she wanted to have,
1:08:08
she was new and her 6th graders were going to take the Barchery.
1:08:13
So she took one of my bow making classes and that morphed into me
1:08:18
making. Eventually I was, I was having
1:08:22
all the 6th graders from all Pacific Northwest Waldorf
1:08:25
schools from Idaho and Oregon and whatnot and Washington
1:08:28
state. They're all coming into my shop
1:08:31
for a bow making class. That's incredible.
1:08:34
That was a lot of fun. And what I did, they didn't make
1:08:37
them from scratch. I, I made these bows.
1:08:40
I put Tonkin cane on the back of some E pay.
1:08:44
And at that time I could, there was some really dark black E pay
1:08:50
that was available and I don't know where it came from.
1:08:56
We've got a big wholesaler over in the Sultan, Washington
1:09:02
actually, and I, and they can't get this, the kind of E pay I
1:09:07
was using the E pay that I can get from her now.
1:09:11
It's not as good. I, I for a while I found I could
1:09:15
put, you know, for a compression layer on a laminated bow.
1:09:19
I could put a piece of E pay on the belly of a bow and put a
1:09:22
piece of Tonkin can in the back of it.
1:09:24
I could make anything. I mean, I made some 130 LB bows
1:09:28
with that combination that wow, yeah, it was easy.
1:09:31
But then that, that E pay disappeared and I, there was a
1:09:36
time that I had to make, I found my, I had an order for a bow and
1:09:40
I had to make 3 bows to get one bow.
1:09:43
You know, guess the E pay was, was crystalling on me and soft
1:09:48
pockets in it. And so, you know, but yeah, I
1:09:53
made, I made, I had for a few years anyway, I did 6060 or 76th
1:10:02
graders come through my place a spring, you know, you know, a
1:10:08
lot of the Walder schools are pretty small, but they all came
1:10:12
here. What they, what I would do is I,
1:10:16
I would have the bows already done with a string on them.
1:10:20
And they were, but they weren't really finished.
1:10:23
And I would, you know, bamboo has that kind of waxy thing on
1:10:27
the back of it, you know, as the yeah, you can scrape it and in a
1:10:32
piece of talk and you know, they call that also.
1:10:36
What do they call that? Tea wood?
1:10:38
They call it no tea stick. They call it tea stick.
1:10:41
It is a really pleasant smell. You know, when you scrape that
1:10:44
off, it smells like tea. And so the bows really ready for
1:10:50
them to shoot. But they would they would finish
1:10:54
the backing. They would with a cabinet
1:10:55
scraper, they would finish the the bamboo and then they would
1:11:00
sand the bow and put a coat of finishing on it.
1:11:02
And. But it was enough, enough off
1:11:06
authorship for him to say that you're still there.
1:11:11
There you are. Yeah, my appointment did.
1:11:14
I was. Going to tell you your video had
1:11:15
froze but. But nothing lost there anyway.
1:11:19
Yeah. The.
1:11:21
Yeah, No, they, they all thought they'd all described them as the
1:11:24
bow they made, which was the whole point, whole thing.
1:11:27
They'd only be here for about 3 hours.
1:11:30
They'd finish their bow, they'd have an archery lesson, and then
1:11:34
they were gone, you know, like a flock.
1:11:37
And so I was invaded for, and I had various people would come by
1:11:42
and help me with the kids, you know, so we'd have.
1:11:45
Yeah. It was a lot of fun.
1:11:48
Yeah, it was. That's amazing.
1:11:50
So would you describe yourself as an Archer first turned
1:11:55
bullier, or a bullier who loves archery, or neither?
1:12:01
Oh, gosh, yeah. I, I, I'm definitely a maker of
1:12:06
things. Yeah.
1:12:07
And and and in an Archer both. Are you still shooting
1:12:14
regularly? Oh yeah, yeah.
1:12:17
I don't, I don't, I don't. I'm not social in my archery
1:12:21
right now so much. I have AI have a place to shoot
1:12:25
on my property here and sometimes I'll go quiet.
1:12:29
I generally try to shoot everything I make and, but
1:12:34
mostly I've got a set of bales, you know, in part of my shop and
1:12:39
I've got I'll put up a ping pong ball and shoot at that, you
1:12:43
know, and, and I'll shoot a whole lot of arrows out of a
1:12:48
lightweight bow and then I might shoot a few arrows out of
1:12:52
something heavier. But but yeah, I, you know, it's
1:12:57
the thing with archery is you never do get it right.
1:12:59
You know, you could have a wherever you go in the world,
1:13:06
you you could have a bunch of people, Archers gathered that
1:13:11
say a group of maybe people that have been doing archery for 30
1:13:15
or 40 years and they're talking with each other.
1:13:19
And what they're talking about is that what their release is
1:13:22
like today, You know, how things are shooting the same old
1:13:27
conversation. You know, we archery, that's one
1:13:31
of the things about archery is we do never get it down
1:13:34
perfectly. It's always a challenge.
1:13:37
And that's what keeps it interesting, I think, you know,
1:13:43
some, some days the magic works and some days it doesn't work as
1:13:46
good, you know, so. You mentioned the the rise of
1:13:51
the fiberglass bow and then the compound bow and then kind of
1:13:55
the Renaissance of the primitive bow.
1:13:57
What do you think was partially or largely responsible for that
1:14:01
Renaissance and the the all wood S bow?
1:14:07
I think it was a realization that that the vast revolution
1:14:17
was taking place. In other words, that that the
1:14:21
the, the the simple archery, the people could see it evaporating
1:14:26
right in front of them. The new archery was more of it
1:14:31
if the modern bow is shot arrows still, but the metaphor was not
1:14:37
you know what it was aiming it it was it was more just a a huge
1:14:48
shift in things. It's still a challenge to shoot
1:14:50
a compound bow accurately for sure, but but.
1:14:57
Seems like the compound bows would be more of a sport and and
1:15:01
the permit of our tree is more of a a lifestyle I would say.
1:15:08
Well, yeah, I think so. But but although both, both of
1:15:13
them do offer a lifestyle, there's people that are compound
1:15:16
bow for a lifestyle. I guess what it's true is that
1:15:19
when when you're shooting a, a, a Longbow or you're shooting
1:15:26
just a, you've got three elements.
1:15:28
You've got the string and you got an arrow and you got the
1:15:30
bow. Well, then you've got the
1:15:32
Archer, the four elements in there and that, but that's all
1:15:36
you got. And if you're in a few and
1:15:42
there's a lot of different ways to shoot a Longbow or a recurve
1:15:45
for that matter. I mean, you shoot a Longbow, you
1:15:48
can use the, you can kind of gun barrel, You can look down the
1:15:52
arrow and use the tip of the arrow's naming point.
1:15:54
We all Archers do all those things.
1:15:56
You know, there's no way to do that, But I, I think that the,
1:16:03
the way that Archers the way that probably and it depends on
1:16:07
how far away that target is. You see something way far away,
1:16:11
you aim differently than if it's 10 feet away or 20 feet away or
1:16:15
whatever. You know, for use whatever
1:16:17
method works for you for that one thing, but that simple look,
1:16:22
look and shoot thing with a very simple you know for the for it
1:16:30
would call it intuitive or instinctive Archer.
1:16:33
You could hand that Archer any bow, strange bow, strange set of
1:16:38
arrows. They'll and and a few arrows
1:16:41
they'll be hitting something with it.
1:16:44
Yeah. It it that you figure it out.
1:16:46
You know you don't have to do any.
1:16:49
There's no science to it. It's it's about as complicated
1:16:54
as throwing rocks something and there's a there's a human joy to
1:16:59
that or that what it feels like when you're doing shooting this
1:17:03
simple tackle that more than I think I, I think the compound
1:17:08
guys get the same feeling out of it.
1:17:10
And I, and I've done a lot of firearm shooting too, just for
1:17:12
fun. It's fun to project.
1:17:16
Project what, what the arrow, what's a projectile does?
1:17:19
Is it at some point in time, and particularly with a really
1:17:24
simple bow and arrow, it feels like you just projecting your
1:17:29
energy downrange. The bow disappears and it's just
1:17:33
you sending the arrow down range.
1:17:36
And, and there's the fact that we can have this hand eye
1:17:43
coordination, ability to to and on a good, you know, there's
1:17:48
some days, some days you can't hit, but some days you can't
1:17:51
miss, you know, yeah, it's it's funny that way.
1:17:55
And but I think that that that's the joy that that's a very
1:18:03
simple joy that you can shoot an arrow in and see that success in
1:18:10
for a brand new Archer shooting in a backyard somewhere.
1:18:13
You see the light bulb go off, you know, in their head that
1:18:16
wow, look what I just did, you know.
1:18:20
And so the simpler the tackle is, I think that, that, that it
1:18:27
may be easier to reach that particular joy that the compound
1:18:31
bows are to some degree like our, our laptop computers that I
1:18:34
was fighting with this morning. We there, we get some sense that
1:18:39
they're really not our friends, you know, and a guy opens up
1:18:44
his, his case and takes his compound bow out.
1:18:48
And some days it seemed like some gremlin has been in there
1:18:51
mucking with this bow because it doesn't work like it did the day
1:18:54
before. And, and with a, with a Longbow
1:18:59
or something, you know that the only gremlin is you because the
1:19:05
bow doesn't change. You know, I used to tell guys
1:19:09
when they were outfitting him with, with compound bows, with
1:19:12
their, with everything on the bow.
1:19:14
I'd, I'd caution him, I'd say, you know, if you can take your
1:19:19
compound bow set up and throw it on the ground and pick it up and
1:19:24
it still works, there's an advantage to that because people
1:19:29
drop both. You know, if if you drop your
1:19:32
bow and you have to go home, that's not a good thing.
1:19:37
Yeah. You know, you could take your
1:19:40
log bow and throw it across the field and Yeah.
1:19:44
And pick it up and shoot it. You know, it's happy.
1:19:47
You know it's a yeah. Got a few more questions for
1:19:51
you, Jay. When you're carving primitive
1:19:54
bows, self bows, what kind of tools do you like to use?
1:19:58
Well, I, I really like I, I, I really enjoy using draw knives
1:20:04
and I more more so than a than a spoke shave and only because I
1:20:11
like to be able to see the blade directly and see what the blades
1:20:14
doing. And and I really enjoy working
1:20:18
with a draw knife to to rough a bow out.
1:20:22
I'll use, I'll use a hatchet sometimes if it just feels like
1:20:25
the right time that you know, right thing to do.
1:20:29
And so I'll take a bow quite a ways with the, with the draw
1:20:34
knife And what I did my my bow classes, I'd have my students
1:20:38
spend a bit of time with a draw knife just because it's fun to
1:20:43
use a really. And I, what I would use on you
1:20:45
is I would use AI would get a really sharp draw knife.
1:20:48
And my draw knives are all like ones that I got off of eBay over
1:20:54
time or had collected and like they're all turn of the century,
1:20:59
turn of the last century before tools.
1:21:02
But there's a whole ocean of them out there, you know, they
1:21:05
made I, I can't imagine how many hundreds of thousands of
1:21:09
millions of drawn knives are out there, you know, So wow, that's.
1:21:13
That's why I love the vintage tools.
1:21:15
Yeah, yeah. So that's that's what I my my
1:21:17
favorite one of those is I've got one that was to, you know,
1:21:22
antebellum tool is it was 18 fifties Ohio tool company and
1:21:29
it's just got a great feel to it and it's you know, it's got a
1:21:33
great blade. It's got a curved it's a
1:21:35
straight blade, but it's curved and it isn't dished, so to
1:21:40
speak, like the best carving drawn eyes.
1:21:44
I TH Witherby the Witherby's always like if I can find a
1:21:51
Witherby tool on this, the right shape on eBay, I'll I'll buy
1:21:56
those if I see them sometimes. And that does Wilkinson made a
1:22:01
folding handle draw knife that have always worked pretty good.
1:22:05
But so I used that. And then what I would do is I
1:22:09
would go directly from the draw knife to a cabinet scraper.
1:22:13
And I and we do. I have my students and myself.
1:22:16
They, I do my fine work with a, with a, with a simple
1:22:22
rectangular cabinet scraper, yeah, with a with a good
1:22:26
burnished edge on it. And it's, it's surprising how
1:22:32
much wood you can take off with a cabinet scraper if you're not
1:22:35
careful. So working around knots, you
1:22:42
know, it's, it's its own little thing to do and it's you can't
1:22:46
excavate with a cabinet scraper. You can only work over high
1:22:51
stuff and if you try. So it's, it's kind of a back and
1:22:55
forth for me. I, I try to do a lot with it
1:22:59
with the draw knife. So what, what did you use on
1:23:02
your, on your cannonball hole? One of those scrapers of
1:23:09
different kinds. Yeah, well, I always start with
1:23:12
a draw knife as well, so a lot of that was shaping it out with
1:23:15
a draw knife, but then scraper. I like the Shinto rasp and I
1:23:21
think probably those three were the main tools I used on that.
1:23:27
I had a little a round rasp that I was using to clean out some of
1:23:33
the the holes, the knot holes in it, but for the most part shaped
1:23:38
it with with those three primary tools and those would be those
1:23:42
would be my go to for almost any build, the draw knife, the
1:23:45
Shinto rasp and scrapers. I'm going to have to go research
1:23:49
the Shinto rasp pipe. I don't, I don't I've used Oh
1:23:56
gosh, I I found some what I guess it's called a flat bastard
1:24:03
rasp that has a larger, more simplified teeth on it.
1:24:10
But that's I and the Shinto rasp.
1:24:13
You know, I've never used one of those.
1:24:15
OK. I'll have.
1:24:17
I'll have to try that. In my journeys and working with
1:24:20
different bowyers, probably half of them love the Shinto rasp and
1:24:25
Oh yeah, and probably half of them haven't used it.
1:24:27
So I just really enjoy it. It's, it holds its, its
1:24:31
sharpness well. And there's something about
1:24:34
Japanese jewels. They they know what they're
1:24:37
doing and so. Oh yeah, you can.
1:24:40
They have a pretty great design I think, and one side is one
1:24:44
side's finer teeth, the other side is slightly bigger teeth
1:24:47
for more wood removal. Yeah, the Japanese woodworking
1:24:53
style were where the woodworkers device.
1:24:56
They don't use bench vices and things you they generally hold
1:25:02
the material with their with their hands or feet while
1:25:05
they're working on them. And which is is different.
1:25:09
I know I, I we can learn so much from other bow makers and what
1:25:13
in the different things they do. I, I had a bow student that was
1:25:18
a fellow that made cellos and he brought some of his, he had some
1:25:24
planes that had they, they're the little tiny finger planes
1:25:32
that had, oh, the, it's not serrated, but they had the, the
1:25:39
plane Iron was, had little teeth in it actually.
1:25:43
So he could cruise around with that thing and, and without
1:25:47
doing any tearing and whatnot. But anyway, that was an
1:25:49
interesting tool and, and seeing what he did.
1:25:54
So, yeah, there's a lot of yeah, yeah, we always, we're always,
1:26:00
I'm building things differently now than I did 10 years ago and
1:26:03
20 years ago. And and, you know, we, whatever
1:26:07
we do, it seems to keep evolving.
1:26:10
And that's kind of the fun. Yeah.
1:26:11
I, there's some wow. Yeah, yeah.
1:26:19
I and I, when I make, when I work commercially, I work, you
1:26:23
know, of course I have a bandsaw.
1:26:25
I don't have a lot of stuff though.
1:26:27
Here I've got a I've got a 14 inch bandsaw with A2 horsepower
1:26:33
motor around. It's got a big motor on it and I
1:26:37
have belt Sander and I got a dramatic sanding drum and in
1:26:42
those three power tools are in the only.
1:26:45
That's pretty much what I use for everything else.
1:26:48
The some some days bow making it.
1:26:52
Some days are only good for making big pieces of wood and
1:26:56
just smaller pieces of wood. Yeah.
1:27:00
In other days you're good for fine work.
1:27:02
You know what I mean? Yeah.
1:27:03
Do you have a brand that you carve under and sell those
1:27:06
under? Well, yeah, I I have, I've been
1:27:10
using them, but it's Pacific U brand, which is not very
1:27:15
original, but it it's just, you know, if a person researches
1:27:20
Pacific U and Saint Charles. You came up with me on there.
1:27:24
OK, Pack you has been my handle on Instagram, other places,
1:27:30
yeah. OK.
1:27:31
So and then another thing, earlier on you mentioned your
1:27:34
dad wrote a book on archery. What was that?
1:27:36
What's that book called? He, well, he wrote, yeah, he
1:27:39
wrote a book called Billets to Bow, OK.
1:27:43
And it was a paperback originally.
1:27:47
And we've got a hardbound when it's still the hardbound 1 is
1:27:51
both of them are out of print. We have copies.
1:27:55
I have I have a hard I have hard bound copies of billets to bow.
1:27:59
And then he made a he made AVHS. Well, it's actually a DVD now.
1:28:04
He made a video called Billets to Bow also and making and it's
1:28:08
making you both. Yeah, very cool.
1:28:12
Well, Jay, listen, I really appreciate you taking all this
1:28:15
time to talk with me. It's been great hearing your
1:28:17
story and so much history and what you've, what you've
1:28:22
experienced in your life in the area of bow making and archery.
1:28:25
It's incredible. Well, it it continues to be a
1:28:29
lot of fun. That's great.
1:28:31
Do you have anything you want to add?
1:28:33
Any questions, anything before we sign off?
1:28:38
Well, I, I, I don't know other than yeah, don't, don't.
1:28:44
If you don't expect to be successful right away, they'll
1:28:49
be afraid to throw it over your shoulder and always have.
1:28:52
If you've got multiple projects going, the then you've got
1:28:57
something to turn to again right away.
1:28:59
You can get back on your horse again.
1:29:01
Yeah. And is there anywhere where
1:29:04
people can find you online? Yeah, I, I think the easiest
1:29:09
place now is just on my Facebook or Instagram.
1:29:12
I've got a website, but it, it's a cobwebs site that I haven't, I
1:29:16
haven't like cobwebs. Played this for a long time.
1:29:18
Like that and I. Packed you on Instagram and pack
1:29:23
and Saint Charles on Facebook and Pacific you on Facebook as
1:29:28
well. So then I've got a post on
1:29:31
there, so OK, best place to reach me?
1:29:34
Yeah, right. Well, thank you so much.
1:29:37
I really appreciate it and keep keep inspiring, keep inspiring
1:29:42
others to do this. It's amazing.
1:29:44
Well, thanks. Thanks for what you're doing.
1:29:48
Your your book project is is fascinating.
1:29:52
I don't have a copy of it yet, but no.
1:29:53
One does, yet October 20th it comes out.
1:29:56
So I've got an, I've got an advanced copy which I've been
1:30:00
tugging around with me everywhere and sharing with
1:30:02
people. But yeah, it's, it's been an
1:30:05
amazing experience. Yeah, it sounds like it is.
1:30:10
It sounds pretty terrific. I I look forward to hunting that
1:30:12
book down. So thank you.
1:30:14
Thank you for doing that. My pleasure, Thank you and to
1:30:17
all the boaters out there who have been so receptive to it.
1:30:20
Couldn't have done it without the community.
1:30:23
Yeah, what a what a crew, Yeah. Well, thanks again, Jay.
1:30:29
Thank you. Thanks for listening to Project
1:30:38
Quiver on Salish Wolf. Follow our journey on Instagram
1:30:41
and YouTube at Project Quiver Official as we discover the
1:30:44
world's most extraordinary traditional bow years, and join
1:30:47
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1:30:50
Quiver, The Art of Life through Bow Craft, our photographic and
1:30:53
narrative exploration of traditional bow carving
1:30:55
published by Trope, will be available in fall 2026.
1:30:59
We are honored to share with you the beauty, tradition, and magic
1:31:02
of the bow and arrow. The book is Quiver.
1:31:05
The journey is Project Quiver. This is the Salish Wolf podcast.