[Archers] Ben Pearson Bows

[Garth Groff]

Noble Friends of the Bow,

This past weekend I hit the jackpot at a yard sale, coming up with three 
fiberglass bows in good condition to add to my loaner kit. Curiosity 
about what I had sent me digging around on the web, and I found a 
wonderful site with Ben Pearson archery catalogs: 
http://www.benpearsonarchery.net/bows.html . If you take an interest in 
Ben Pearson bows, or old bows in general, this site has a lot of good 
information, though you have to tease it out of the catalog descriptions.

The Ben Pearson bow I bought turned out to be a #306 Fiberglass "Take 
Down" (a socket-type). This bow was introduced in 1954, probably the 
first glass-fiber bow in the line (there was also a slightly smaller one 
available in 1954), and was carried on into the 1955 catalog. The 1956 
catalog is missing, and this bow does not appear among the smaller 
take-downs in the 1957 listings. The bow is 5' 6" long, and made 
entirely of fiberglass, factory-painted a light tan (described as 
"cowhorn"), with a horsehide grip and dual arrow shelves at the top of 
the grip. Ben Pearson's signature in gold lettering is on a decal, and 
the number "306" appears just below the grip. It was available in 45-85 
pound weights at 5 pound intervals. Mine draws at 42 pounds, not bad for 
a bow almost as old as I am. Once I cleaned it up with a little alcohol, 
it appeared to be in near-mint condition, and there are certainly no 
visible cracks. I haven't had a chance to shoot it yet, as it takes a 
string that I did not have in stock. An order to 3Rivers went out this 
morning. I did string it briefly with a 1" shorter string, and the limbs 
curve correctly, but the brace height is 8", and I believe that is too 
high to be safe.

In scanning through the catalogs, I noticed the infamous Ben Pearson 
"Jet Bows", which were introduced in 1957, and continued past Pearson's 
ownership into the Leisure Sports-era of the late 1960s beyond. I have 
had several Jet Bows, and find their history interesting. These were 
fiberglass youth bows with a molded rubber grip, made in several sizes 
and draw weights. These were numbered in the 33X series (I noted one 
numbered 444 in the catalogs). The models were variously knows as Jet, 
Power-Jet, Super-Jet and Strato-Jet. Around 1967, the year Pearson 
retired and sold his company, bows began to have a four-digit model 
number. The basic Jet Bow became 3330 and so on. Jet Bows were also sold 
by at least two other vendors, perhaps made by Pearson/Leisure Sports, 
or maybe made under license. I own a Loxley 0333, which due to a crack 
is in my "dead bow" collection. Those of you who have taken the warrant 
class from me all had a chance to handle this one. I had another in the 
Shire loaner kit which was also cracked, and was marked with another 
brand name I've forgotten, but still with the 33X numbering. I believe 
this is one I gave to Ivaar for his teaching kit. Another from the Shire 
loaners, a true Ben Pearson, is also retired to my teaching kit with 
severe limb damage.

The reason I'm going on about these Jet Bows is because there are still 
a lot of them floating around, and they are very dangerous. The 
fiberglass tends to separate and peel lengthwise. You can get some very 
interesting splinters on these, and the limb ends tend to deteriorate 
badly. Of the eight or so I've come across, only two appeared safe to 
shoot. One in good condition was in use by a Scadian (IIRC, I inspected 
this very carefully at Pennsic and saw no separations). The second was 
for sale at an antiques mall. I passed.

I was also pleased to be able to ID two other Ben Pearson bows I own, or 
used to own. One was a Pony model, introduced in 1963. This was a really 
lovely little fiberglass/wood recurve, but with odd nylon pegs for arrow 
rests. Without a cut-out arrow rest, it shot far to the left, as if it 
were a traditional bow shot off the hand. I eventually removed the pegs, 
and experimented with shooting it off my hand. It was not the sort of 
bow to give to a beginner, so I traded it to one of the dealers at 
Pennsic. The other was a Cougar recurve. Mine was model 7050, first 
showing up in the 1969 catalog. This was my second bow in the SCA, and I 
shot it for several years until I switched to a longbow. Sadly, the 
Cougar has a system of very fine horizontal cracks on the bow's back 
where the upper limb meets the grip. This is a problem I've seen with 
other older recurves, and suggests either the fiberglass itself is weak, 
or there is a weakness in the wood underneath which is causing the glass 
overflex. This is something all marshals should watch for. The Cougar 
was also retired to the dead bow collection.

A couple of other things I would like to mention before I close. A lot 
of Ben Pearson's early bows were backed with silk, something I've never 
heard of before. These were mostly his high-end bows. By the 1940s, most 
of the mid-quality bows were backed with "fiber", and later "vulcanized 
fiber". It isn't clear to me with this was, or what it looked like, but 
it does not appear to be fiberglass. I had always thought fiberglass 
dated from the late 1940s, and I have another dead bow, a York Archery 
longbow with fiberglass backing (one side of the limbs only), that 
appears to be from this era. Pearson did not introduce a "glass-powered" 
bow until 1955.

It is amazing what you can find here. I wish I could find a similar site 
for Bear bows. I would love to know how old by Bear/Sears Hawk is.

I hope some of you will look over this site. It is quite interesting. 
Perhaps this will spark more discussion and information sharing here.

Yours Aye,


Lord Mungo Napier, The Archer of Mallard Lodge