That was a common way to store recurves 'back in the day'. My dad still stores his that way.
That '56 Polar strung backwards makes me cringe. I love those old girls!
I let a friend borrow one of my old reflexed longbows this summer. He called telling me he couldn't use it because the string kept falling off every other shot and it only felt like 15#. Yup, he had strung it backwards.