Tice and Watts information

[gaswamp]

Greetings all! Glad to find this forum.  I'll have to get this out in the open and I hope you all don't hold it against me but I am a compound hunter.  However, I am starting to get the urge to see what this traditional stuff is about.
OK on to the point.  My decesed uncle use to make bows for Tice and Watts archery in Huntsville Alabama.  My brother inherited most of the bows that my uncle had in his collection.  I have two of them.  I never talked to my uncle when I was young about archery so have no sence of the history of these bows.  Will someone tell me if they have ever heard of them and what they know about them.  Thanks in advance.

[SERGIO VENNERI]

Hi Joe;
      I know a bit of the history of Tice and Watts Bows.Lovell Tice and Bill Watts of Huntsville Alabama ,were a couple of physicists with the NASA program. They were also avid bowhunters, who decided to ( in their quest for a fast Bow)to design there own with the aid of the NASA computer.They built several Models ( i can send you a color copy of one of there Pamphlets if you would like. The unique thing about their Bows was that they used a 3-thousands per inch taper and Also tapered their Glass, to remove weight from the reflex part of their limb.
     Lovell Tice Died ,I believe in the early '70s and Bill soon lost interest in the company , orders were slow and their Dealers were getting upset with the slow delivery.
     Bow tests showed that this was a great bow design and was faster than the Jack Howard Gamemaster Jet, Doug Kittredge who owned th "Bow Hut "in Mammoth Lakes California was shooting a Tice & Watts. he killed the worlds record mountain lion with it back then.
     At some point in the early '70s Tom philips of Rocky Face Georgia bought the company and equipment and built some bows and they had actually developed a Take down model which never made it to the dealers and the company and equip. were sold ( rumour has it to some one in Mississipi ).
     i find it hard to believe that with all the copying going in today, where you can hardly tell several different bows from one and other that no one has bought the equip and continued to make one of the finest bows ever designed.
      I still have 3 of these bows , a 58" 57# Rosewood Master hunter, a 62" 50# Maple Spartan and a Factory Camo Painted 58" 53# Titan hunter.

           Hope I was Of some Help

                Sergio

[PAPALAPIN]

I have a 58" 55# SPARTAN in my collection.  It is  a camo model and I think has a solid hard rock maple riser.These are very rae bows nowadays, and extremely hard to find.  You wil lsee them on eBAY every now and then.  In my opinion, they are real collectors items.

If you are just starting to get interested in Traditional Archery, you have a great bow to start with.  The problem here is that if you end up not being a good shot, you can't blame it on the bow.

I am also a GREAT JACK HOWARD enthusiest.  I have about 8 0f Jack's bows.  I have never checked the speed of my Tice & Watts agains any of my Jack Howard bows and will be surprised if it is faster, although I can't make that statement without checking it first.  The only bow that I know of that checked out faster than my Howards was a BORDER BLACK DOUGLAS bow out of Scotland.  It smoked mine pretty good.

From what I know of the background on Tice & Watts, Sergio is right on.  He pretty much said all I could have said, and a bit more.

I don't know when I will get to do it, but now Sergio has peaked my interest in the speed vs my Howards.

[gaswamp]

Thanks guys for the great information.  The two bows that I got from my Uncle's estate are:
The Master 34 pound 68 inches long 28 draw
The Spartan Hunter 37 pound 62 inches lng 28 draw

Obviously, I won't be able to hunt with them but I am going to shoot with them.  I did check them thouroughly and everything seems to be in pristine condition.  I am going to try to pry a few away from my brother who got 8 or 10 of them since he helped take care of the estate.  But as he has no interest in archery I hope he will be understanding.  The only thing I regret now is that I did not talk more with my uncle about archery.  Of course I was very little in the early 70's when he was building them.  He was a carpenter by trade, so I assume he worked with Tice and Watts on a part time basis.  Unfortunately, his wife and kids are all gone so I don't have much information there.  

Again, you guys have been great.  I would ask you to give me a couple of the best traditional outfitter supply catalogs for strings and rests.

[gaswamp]

Sergio, I sent you an email

[SERGIO VENNERI]

Hi Jack;
       I'm going to be out of town from tomorrow 'til monday. Will contact you by phone or P.M. when i'm back and we can talk about the Bow speeds. I did some testing with my own Chrony and different recurves a few years ago. you will probably find the results as surprising and interesting as I did.
       Meanwhile this is a long weekend coming up and I'm heading to Ottawa ( an 8 hour drive) for my Grandson and son's birthdays.

             Have a great weekend

                  Sergio

[PAPALAPIN]

Sergio

Good thing you waited.  I was out of town from Last Tuesday until Friday.  Back now.  Call any time

[gaswamp]

Thks agn Sergio

[PAPALAPIN]

I met a young man at our Northern Zone Shoot in Georgia a couple of weeks ago, and he was shooting one of the nicest Tice & Watts bows I have ever seen.  He picked it up in a pawn shop for $11.00. I offered to let him double his money, but he was not that dumb. He was a teenager from Tennessee.

[SERGIO VENNERI]

Ciao Jack;
         Your package is on the way! I also included a Tice and Watts Brochure.

                Sergio

[PAPALAPIN]

THANKS SERGIO

Looking forward to getting it.

[CheapShot]

Jack, that young man is my 16 year old son, Taylor. Pretty good kid if I do say so myself. He won't shoot anything but his Tice & Watts. We enjoyed shooting with you at Joe's place. Maybe we'll see you at one of the Georgia shoots.That Jack Howard recurve you were shooting is flat out beautiful. By the way, I paid 12 dollars for that bow, I talked him down from 20 dollars.lol. Thanks for all the info on the Tice & Watts bows very interesting.

[PAPALAPIN]

ALAN

Sorry I could not remember Taylor's name in my senility.

By the way folks, Taylor is also a great shot with that Tice & Watts, and it is evident where he gets it from.  No, not from Alan, from his mom.  I shot the course with them and she insisted on shooting from the men's stakes.  She held her own.  We all decided to take about a 70 yard shot at a whitetail target, just for fun.  The staked distabce was about 35 yds.  Everyone missed the whole target with the exceotion of, guess who.  Taylor's mom nailed it in the center of the kill zone.  While all the guys shot again from the stake for score, we let her score stand.

Not only a good shot, Taylor was a very polite young man.  Rare these days.  You have one to be proud of there, Alan.

I'll still give him $25.00 for the T&W.

[gaswamp]

wow, thats better than a birthday....a nice find in a pawn shop

[redhairing]

Hi- just joined the forum today after fooling around with a Google search on my Dad's name which lead me to this forum. My Dad was Lovell Tice of Tice & Watts Archery....I'm no bow expert and was only a child in the 60's when my Dad's company was in production.
I have 4 of his bows and most of the Archery World magazines with his articles as Technical Editor at the time. I also have some of his technical papers and marketing materials. He passed away from lymphoma cancer at the very young age of 42 in 1971 when I was 13. If I can be of any help with info...I'm glad to do it. I am so pleased to find the collectors here who appreciate his beautiful bows. thank you!

[neuse]

Thats a really tough age to lose your dad redhairing.
Glad you have some great keep sakes, pas those on to your grand kids.

[reddogge]

redhairing, we may have crossed paths online a few years ago when you (at least I think if was you) posted on another forum about your dad.

I have two T&W bows, a 50# 58" Spartan Hunter MkI and a 60" 55# Spartan Hunter MkI in factory camo. They are very fast and smooth shooting bows I might add. Would be glad to post a picture if your wish.

[Ray Lyon]

Susan,
 
Welcome and thank you for the information about your dad. I've never run across one of your dad's bows (fairly rare as noted by some of the posts above), however I did receive the Kittredge Bow Hut catalog (with Doug Kittredge noted praise of the Tice and Watt's bows) in the 1970's as a young kid and your dad's bows were at the top of my 'wish list' even though I was 13 or 14 years old at the time.

[tippit]

I have two Tice & Watts Mark I recurves 58" 61#28.  One very pretty wood ? and the other factory camo.  Their serial # very close 10259 & 10262.  They are like book ends...unfortunately I can't shoot that much weight anymore.  When I could, they were screamers...tippit

[tippit]

My two Tice & Watts bows....