A Classic Bow:

The American Longbow

by Ron Prusinski

When asked to name a classic bow, most primitive archers would probably mention the English Longbow of Robin Hood fame or Fred Bear's Kodiak recurve. Both of these bows have carved their niche in archery history, but between these two great bows are dozens of lesser-known classics. In the second quarter of the last century, as archery was becoming a popular pastime, bow makers faced a dilemma. The popular English style longbow with its flat back and rounded belly was difficult to build, and the merits of the shorter native flat bows were not yet recognized.

About this time, a group of physicists and experimenters developed an interest not only in archery but in optimizing the performance of the wood bow and wood arrows. Paul Klopsteg, Forrest Nagler, C. N Hickman, and W. J. Rheingans experimented, debated, and most importantly wrote about bow performance. Much of their work was gathered into a publication called Archery, The Technical Side. As the name implies, it is not your standard bow-making book. I obtained a copy on the inter-library exchange.

Filled with mathematical formulas, graphs, and illustrations (figure 1), it is not an easy read, but it addresses almost every aspect of wooden bows and arrows. What evolved from their research was the American Longbow. Paul Klopsteg was a major promoter of this design, including penning his preference in an article in the American Journal of Physics in 1942.

Sometimes referred to as a pyramid design, this bow is long, relatively narrow, and flat on both back and belly. Its chief advantage is that much of the tillering is done with the bow’s width, allowing an almost uniform bow thickness.

The mathematical approach to the bow can be seen in figure 2. In practice, it is not at all complicated; the bow is a straight taper from the handle fadeouts to the tip. Theoretically, by matching the thickness and taper to the properties of the various types of wood, large numbers of these bows could be produced with minimal tillering. This was ideal for bow makers trying to turn out large quantities with minimal effort.

The then popularity of long narrow bows and the ready availability of prime bow woods favored this design. Also, since the limbs were designed independent of the hand, a handle of any reasonable length would do. Photo 3 shows what I call my "Classic" bow, not only because of the design but because it was built at the 2009 Twin Oaks Traditional Archery Classic. The Twin Oaks shoot and Tennessee facilities have been highlighted several times in this magazine. One of the matches at the "Classic” is the Self Bow Challenge. You start a few days ahead with a stave and compete with the bow on Sunday.

This bow was started on Thursday afternoon and was shootable by Sunday morning. It is made from a tropical wood called pau loupe, also known as Brazilian walnut; it is a species of ipe. The wood has almost no growth rings and is so hard and dense it won’t even float. This makes it very difficult to work with. Band saw and belt sander were the order of the day and as shown in photos 4 and 5. The Twin Oaks bow shed and helpful membership are wellsuited to the needs of the bow maker, novice or veteran.

The bow I built measures 71" from nock to nock. The handle is 5" with 1 1/2" fadeouts at each end. The arrow pass is 2" above center. The limb width tapers from 1 1/2" at the fadeouts to 1/2" at the nocks. The limb thickness is an almost uniform 1 7/32" from the fadeouts to about 7" from the tip. This is where the limb width is the same as its thickness. Here we change to a square cross section so that the thickness of the limb does not exceed the limb width. The draw weight is 55# at 28". As predicted, there was very little adjustment needed to touch up the tiller.

As you can imagine, the bow was not completely finished in just three days, but it was ready to shoot. Bare wood, a temporary string, and, as shown in photo 6, a handle was glued up and lashed into place. Not real pretty, but I was able to place fourth out of some twenty shooters who also had usable bows in time for Sunday's shoot.

Once I was home the bow could be properly finished (photo 7). I added a new handle and contrasting nock overlays and then finished the bow with multiple coats of Tru-oil. None of this added to the performance of the bow, but it did highlight the gorgeous chocolate brown color of the wood.

The scientific design has it merits, but unfortunately, theory often hits the cold light of reality. We no longer live in an age where old growth lumber allows stave after stave of flawless wood. Bowers spoke of twenty-two lines to the inch on woods such as sassafras. Today some tropical woods come close, but they are neither cheap nor readily available. The modern bowyer has to work around flaws and variations in the wood, making a constant thickness very troublesome. The snaky stave we so highly praise today would in times past have been stove wood to keep the shop warm. Also missing are the shorter hunting bows we use today. While this design will work with shorter bows, they look clubby and lack the visual appeal of today’s traditionally-shaped flat bow designs. The switch to fiberglass and laminated limbs soon brought an end to the commercial production of all-wood designs; that is, until us primitive folks showed up.

So, if you like the long, lean, lithe in-the-hand feel of an English longbow, you just might try its classic cousin, the American Longbow.