Tannehill Park to host Howard Hill archery competition first weekend ...

In traditional archery, practitioners eschew increasingly high-tech modern or "compound" bows, with their electronic sights and elaborate systems of weights and cams that make it easier to draw the bow.

Instead, they use gear -- including long bows and "recurves" -- that is not that different from the weapons people used to hunt for food thousands of years ago.

The tournament will be a three-day, multi-round event with the highest score from either day determining the winner.?

There will also be a Saturday shoot-off between the top 32 male and female competitors, the Byron Ferguson Shooting Clinic and a "One Shot, One Kill" competition for Howard Hill-style longbows.

There will be vendors, awards, and equipment raffles to benefit the Boy Scouts and the Wounded Warrior Project.

The competition is named in honor of Howard Hill , an Alabama native dubbed "the World's Greatest Archer."?

Hill won 196 field tournaments in a row, made films in Hollywood and played football at Auburn University. He was inducted into the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame in 1971 and died in 1975.

The allegiance of traditional archers to this ancient craft is a "minor personal rebellion against the modern world,"?according to Hall of Fame archer G. Fred Asbell, who took part in another traditional archery event, the "Pre-Spring Arrow Fling," at Tannehill in February.

"It's just more of a challenge to shoot without sights and just with your instincts," said archer and "Arrow Fling" participant Dwight Millsaps.

"It's a sport you can never master," said Joe Lasch of?Compton Traditional Bowhunters.?"There's no such thing. Similar to golf, I guess. You can always find a place to get better."

Simplicity is at the heart of the appeal of traditional archery, according to Lasch. "You eliminate all the technical gadgets, stabilizers and all that stuff," he said. "You just pick up a bow, draw it back and shoot it."

Shooting ranges at the Howard Hill event will be open Thursday & Friday, 6 a.m.-5 p.m.; Saturday, 6 a.m.-4 p.m.; and Sunday, 6 a.m.-noon.

Dinner will be provided Saturday night at 6:30 p.m. by Jim n' Nick's BBQ.

All vendors are welcome, and there are no fees except for those associated with camping or using power in the park.

For all of the details -- including the cost to participate in the tournament, "One Shot, One Kill" competition or the shooting clinic -- go to?www.howardhillse.com.

To reserve a spot in the shooting clinic, contact organizer Terry Harris at 205-822-3563 or archertw@bellsouth.net.

Tannehill Ironworks Historical State Park is located at 12632 Confederate Parkway in McCalla.

For more information, call 205-477-5711 or go to?www.tannehill.org.

For more news from Bessemer and McCalla, go to?www.al.com/local/bessemer.?

Source: http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2013/05/tannehill_park_to_host_howard.html

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