About 10 years ago I was at the local flea market and was carrying around a recurve that I had bought there. A guy came up to me to look at it and said that he had several that he had bought there over the last few months and that he might be interested in selling them.
An hour later we were at his house looking at them and agreeing on a price. They were all strung backwards, but then a lot of people do that for storage. After money had been exchanged, he picked up one of the bows and started to draw it back. I stopped him before he hit full draw, and he got a puzzled look on his face. Then I strung the bow correctly and handed it back to him. He looked at the bow, and then cautously drew it back, muttering under his breath something like "Well I'll be d#@%d." Apparently he had been trying to shoot these bows strung backwards.
While I was in the service (1961-1965) a friend of my younger brother saw my favorite bow (a laminated all bamboo bow) stung it backwards, and then pulled it to full draw. As you might expect, it flew apart. Gosh, I wish I had it back.