Waxing Nostalgic

[Bowwild]

I'm not legal to participate in these threads for another 33 days.

[cahaba]

Zebco 33 reels,single shot shotguns and bows could be bought at the hardware store. Deer were rare to see but small game was plentiful. We catfished almost every night in the summer and made coffee from the creek water; boiled in a coffee can and the grounds strained thru any cloth we could find.

  We could walk out our backdoor and hunt all day and never see a posted sign.

  There was a café in town and the cook was an old African American lady. We would bring her squirrels or rabbits and she would make us a big ole cheeseburger in exchange. If we got a possum she would throw in a milkshake. Cokes were 5 cents. The barter was done out the back of the café..

    We got 3 pair of bluejeans and 1 pair of boots (called brogans) once a year at Sears and Roebuck. These were our hunting clothes and school clothes. They had better last cause that was all we would get for the year. If we got holes in them momma would sew on patches to cover the holes. We had one nice "outfit" for church and church only.

     Them were the good ole days for me.

[centaur]

When I was 9 or 10, I got a fiberglass bow (Indian, as I remember) and some wood arrows. I kind of learned to shoot with that bow, although I doubt that I had any clue about anchor point, picking a spot, or any other keys to decent shooting. We lived on the edge of the desert at Ft. Bliss, Texas, and that vast open country was my playground. Scared the crap out of lots of lizards and rabbits with that bow. Where I used to play is now just part of El Paso, but when I was a pup, you could go for miles into the desert that was across the street from my house.
My uncle had a farm outside of Willcox, Arizona, and that is where my hunting started getting a bit more sophisticated. Rabbits caught hell with me and my single shot 22.
I finally got serious about bows right after getting out of the Army in 1970. Bought one of Fred Bear's creations, and ever since, I have had a love affair with stick and string.

[PICKNGRIN]

My first bow tag as a 14 yr old in Wisconsin cost $1.50.  The Holiday gas station in town is where I got my first real hunting bow for $24.  It was a 43# Ben Pearson Gamester.

[Marc B.]

The Vance hardware store was a Bear dealer and had bunches of them in stock. My first little Red Bear bow and Johnson Century fishing reel came from there. They also sold Evinrude outboards and kept surplus rifles in barrels. That was a cool store!

This years hunting coat was always last years winter coat, the color didn't matter.

Dad's Plymouth station wagon hauled us hunting, camping, fishing, and even hauled wood to heat the house. We did everything in that car.

[Bladepeek]

I can remember my first bow. It was a no-name fiberglass recurve, dual shelf (meaning a molded plastic grip). If you guys have seen A Christmas Story, where Ralplhie has come nearly unglued waiting for Christmas morning to open presents, that was me. Ralphie wanted a "genuine Daisy Red Rider many-shot BB  gun and I had picked out my bow from some magazine ad. Presents all get opened and no BB gun; no bow. Then, Dad sees a long package over in the corner behind the chair. The custom bows I drool over now that top a ton in dollars aren't quite as beautiful as that bow was.

My buddy and I set up hay bales and put an old moth-eaten hide from a deer mount that my mom made me throw out on the bales and shot from ridiculous distances. As mentioned previously, none of the arrows matched, we knew nothing about tuning, but we nailed the neck of that deer pretty regularly. Shot 10 X better than I do now. Maybe because we shot every afternoon after school? Never shot a deer with it, but there were a large number of carp and alligator gar that died from that bow and a monstrously heavy fiberglass fish arrow.

I sold that bow 2 years ago with a new string on it and it still shot well. A little bit of hand shock and not quite as fast as my newer bows, but what the heck, it was getting a bit long in the tooth too.

[Mike Mecredy]

All that still applies to me, except I don't get the magazines you mentioned, and wood arrows are my "big deal".  I hunt with my coats I wear normally.  

Great post,  too bad for many those days are just memories.

[Rick Perry]

I remember dad teaching me how to "hunt" with a .22 single shot and skwerls were the quarry . I was 9 years old . The rules were simple. I could NEVER touch that rifle unless he was present, breaking that rule meant no more rifle EVER . Only head shots were to be taken . I had to make the shot with no help from him .

99% of the hunting skills and woodsmanship required to bowhunt deer can be learned from skwerls.

Today many  modern deer hunting dads take junior out to a heated blind set up with a tripod gun rest and help junior hold the gun while junior pulls the trigger . Then the proud papa brags to everyone how little johnny killed his first deer at the age of 7.The problem is little johnny has learned absolutely nothing about deer hunting from this "hunt"

times have changed      , I'm not sure its for the better

[DamselflyFarm]

Dad teaching me to fly cast when I really just wanted to fish with worm and bobber. Man, have those lessons paid off. Don't even own a spin cast setup.

[Terry Lightle]

You guys are bringing back a lot of memories for me.Almost brings a tear to ones eye wishing it were still that way.Grew up hunting and fishing on about 600 acres and cannot even go for a walk there anymore .

[Hoyt]

I remember me and a buddy doing some serious squirrel hunting with our recurves in the Girl Scout Park (Juliette Low Park..founder of the Girl Scouts)in Savannah, Ga. back in the 50's. Our hunting always spread out into the neighborhood of Gordonston also.

I can imagine how a nice stay at home mom would reaction to some kids killing squirrels with their bows in her front yard today. We did kill some too..those city squirrels let you get real close.

[jonsimoneau]

Man you guys are old! HA! Even though I'm only 34 things were even simpler when I started. Back then leasing had not taken hold in illinois. You could knock on a door and get permission to hunt. I used to go to a place in Fulton county every now and then and enjoy great hunting. These days that 400 acre farm is now leased for over $20,000 per season!  There may be more deer today than in the old days. But a lot of people just cannot access them. Bummer.

[Roadkill]

Lived in a dry county in KY.  We would trade groundhogs or rabbits for beer.  There were no deer to speak of or turkeys and if someone saw a deer, everybody knew.  We took shotguns to school, in our lockers, for first day of dove season.
A day of fishing was never questioned by our psrents, we were gone from rise to set.  Remmber warming up a TV with a small round screen in a huge wooden case.

Orange fiberglass shafts, a requirement to have yourname on the shafts.  
We still have some simplicity, lucky us.....

[duncan idaho]

I read a quote the other day that was insightful, but, also very sad. I think it applies here to everyone with these excellent memories. To be very candid, I dont have very good memories from childhood, but, I envy those who do. I think this applies:

"you are only old when your memories outweight your dreams"

[Rifle River Scout]

Amen and Amen

[Thumper Dunker]

I remember packing my 65 chevey with a rod or two shot gun and rifle and a bow get five dollors worth of gas head up into the hills to see what I could bring home.

[ron w]

I just remembered when I bought my first shotgun from my shop teacher....he came to school with it and I took it home on the school bus......with a box of #6 shells that was part of the deal.....lol and this was in New York.......A Mossberg 500 and a Browning Nomad Stalker on the rack in my room.....I was hot stuff in 1968!!  

[kybownut]

Not knowing or caring about arrow speed or e.f.o.c.,standing and cooking around the campfire without worrying about the scent.Trophys were the hunt not what you hunted for.Ron i can remember taking my shotgun to school on the bus on fridays so i could spend the night with a friend and go squirrel hunting the next morning.Come to think of it I still dont worry much about the speed,efoc,scent,or the trophys.

[joe ashton]

how about going in to the local sporting goods store and finding  good solid cut on contact two blade broad heads not row after row of     mechanical heads!  oh ya, that was only 7 or 8 years ago.
  And Howard Hill at the movies in those short films prior to the main feature.. way cool

[Hoyt]

Going to the general store and buying two or three shotgun shells to go squirrel hunting.

Remember one time buying 50 cents worth of gas..2 gallons and the gas station attendant ask me if I wanted a road map.