Bear Grizzly Identification Guide 1949-1969

[Wade Phillips]

Noble,

The second post of this thread shows the difference in the tips of the 1954,1955/56,1957 on the belly side.

The difference between the 55 and 56 Grizzlys is about as insignificant as anything could possible be...

One has water transfer decals, the other has silk screens.

The 1955 & 1956 Kodiaks are also identical, except their cosmetic markings.

Same for 1955 & 1956 Kodiak Specials.

Structurally, these 1955 & 1956 bows are the same.

As collectors, we have this never ending need to put everything in a unique category by year, even when some years are the same, so we invent ways to fill every year, and begin separating bows, by their cosmetic markings.

Frankly, separating the 1955 & 1956 Kodiaks, Kodiak Specials, and Grizzly bows, is fictional, and strictly an invention of us collectors.

Unfortunately, these cosmetic markings were and are easily changed.

[Wade Phillips]

Originally posted by Noblesinclair:
...Why are there bunches of 55 and 57 grizzly always posted for sale but no 1956 models

Bear produced the 1955 Grizzly for most of two production years, before switching from decals to silk screens for a brief period, then shortly after switching to silk screens, they began production of the 1957 model.

Putting a tapered wedge insert into the tip area of the laminations was a lot less work, less material, and less expense, than creating 4" underlays.

[Wade Phillips]

Just posted an image of the 1964-1969 Grizzly Bows on the fist page to make this thread a little more complete.

 http://tradgang.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=14&t=003114#000002

[Wade Phillips]

Below is an image of the tips of three shall we say "assumed" very early 1949 Bear Grizzly Bows.

The word "assumed" is used because all have the very narrow tips with no overlays like the image that John posted of his very early 1949 Grizzly bows.

Two of the three bows are unmarked and the other one has both the large identification decal and hand printed "GRIZZLY", identical to what John shows on his two very early 1949 Grizzly Bows,  numbers 104 & 200.

All three pictured below also have the same very early 1949 Grizzly characteristics, woven glass back, alum lam under wood belly, thin brush nocks, leather wedge shelf.

However, one was camo painted, and the other has slightly darker woven glass, (possibly it just never faded, or perhaps it was a different run of glass that was darker, not important either way, just wanted to mention the differences). A similar color difference is noticeable in one of the images that John posted on the previous page.

           

[Wade Phillips]

The two unmarked 1949 Grizzly bows, were originally owned by Bob Meaker, the man who took over as head bowyer in 1948, when Nels Grumley left Bear to go out on his own.

Floyd Eccleston acquired the bows from Meaker, along with all of his other bows. Floyd passed away in 1999, and a few years later in the early 2000s, I acquired the two unmarked bows from Floyd's son, Rich Eccleston who then later passed away.

The point of this rambling is to make others aware that some of these very early 1949 Grizzly bows have no decals or markings at all. There is no visible evidence that either unmarked bow ever had any decal or type of marking.

Nor did either bow ever have any tip overlays put on it, which I always thought was strange, but makes more sense now that we all know the very earliest marked Grizzly bows with the large identification decals did not have tip overlays either.

I'm not much for using tip overlays or decals for  identifying the date of a bow, but this particular case is a logical and very rare exception rather than the rule.