Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, October 8, 1995 TAG: 9510090115
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B12 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BILL COCHRAN
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
``So long as the new moon returns in heaven a beautiful bent bow, so long will archery hold the hearts of men.''
Modern compounds, with their cables and pulleys and peep sights, hardly are things of beauty. They have about as much to do with the graceful lines of the moon as they do a manhole cover.
While they may not grip the hearts of men in an idyllic sense, compounds are what most archers toted afield Saturday, when the bowhunting season opened. And for good reason. These bows shoot hard, flat and fast, and have taken much of the guesswork out of homing in on a target within 35 yards.
Clinton Western remembers the pre-compound days, when shooting a bow was akin to throwing a baseball. You did it instinctively, and when something was hit it could be just as surprising to the shooter as it was to the target.
At age 65, Western is a pioneer of modern bowhunting in Virginia, having killed one of the first bucks when the bow season was a new concept four decades ago.
``I killed my first deer in 1954, but that is not the first year I hunted,'' said Clinton, a retired railroader who lives in Vinton. ``The first year I hunted with a bow probably was around 1949 or '50. They had a special area set aside for bowhunters in the North River'' area of Augusta County.
In his 20s and living in Staunton at the time, Western was captivated by the adventures of early 20th century bowhunters, men such as Howard Hill and Saxton Pope. It was an era of straight bows made with an artist's touch from chunks of hickory, lemonwood or Osage orange, of Port Oxford cedar arrows fletched with chicken feathers, of three-bladed Bodkin broadheads, of odd looks given to anyone who called himself a bowhunter.
``I believe the first bow I got was from Firestone in Staunton,'' Western said. ``They had some wooden bows sitting in a corner. I don't think they even had a string on them. I asked the guy, `What do you want for one of those?' He said, `Give me $5.'''
While most modern bowhunters shoot from trees, use sights and discipline their shots to a short, deadly range, it wasn't that way when Western started with a straight bow. You hunted from the ground, often around food patches planted in the national forest, and it was common for a deer to ``jump the string.'' That meant your straight bow sent an arrow with such modest velocity and arching trajectory a deer often could see it coming and get out of the way.
That memorable 1954 season, Western was walking toward a food patch with his wife and fellow bowhunter, Nancy Lee.
``The deer was out in the middle of the patch, standing broad side,'' he said. ``I shot at the thing and it turned to head away from me, and the arrow caught it right under the tail. We stepped it off and as near as we could tell the shot was 52 yards.''
Western took the buck to a taxidermist to have the head mounted and gloves made from the hide.
``When I went back to pick up the stuff, the taxidermist said, `Where did you hit that deer? There wasn't any hole in the hide.' I had to tell him.''
Killing a deer with a bow was so novel The Washington Star dispatched a reporter and a photographer to record Western's accomplishment.
Last season, 18,700 deer were reported killed by bowhunters across Virginia. The challenge was there, in every instance, because bowhunters are the best at getting close to deer. But the lure of an ancient weapon probably had given way to the opportunity to hunt in the uncrowded, colorful woods of October, where success no longer is all that unusual.
by CNB