Legendary Fred Bear 

Bowhunting has grown in leaps and bounds since the early 1970's and compound bows were responsible for that growth, but one man -- the late Fred Bear of Bear Archery -- was among the first to teach our generation that the use of a bow is a productive way to hunt. Today, many folks are returning to the tradional way of the longbow and the recurve. Fred Bear was born in Pennsylvania in 1902. He passed away in 1988, at age 86, after a long battle with lung problems. He was a self-made man who built an archery empire through sheer determination, hard work and a great sense of product promotion. His archery interest began in 1927 when he saw the film, ALASKAN ADENTURES, in Detroit. The film featured Art Young, one of the fathers of modern bowhunting, whom he later met in Detroit and shot with for two years. Although target archery was in vogue around the country at the time, and all through the 1930's, Fred's earliest shooting method was instinctive. When participating in target archery he used the point-of-aim method and later made a bow sight with a match stick held on with a rubber band. Soon he began building handmade bows at his Detroit shop. After several years of bowyering and hunting whitetail deer in Michigan, he moved to Grayling where he would live and work for many years. His Bear Archery Museum in Grayling was a must-see attraction for traveling bow benders. Later the museum was moved to Gainesville, Florida; and now resides at the Bass Pro Shop in Springfield, Missouri where anyone can see his trophy mounts and relive his hunts to Alaska, Canada and Africa.