Howard Hill

Howard Hill (born Lemuel Howard Hill and later cited Howard H. Hill; November 13, 1899 – February 4, 1975) was an expert bowman who for over two decades, from the early 1930s into the 1950s, was often introduced or billed as "The World's Greatest Archer". He established the record for winning the most bow-and-arrow field tournaments in succession, a total of 196 competitions. In addition, Hill served as a supporting actor, trick-shot performer, and technical adviser on archery for Hollywood shorts and feature films. He also produced and directed documentaries and instructional films on bowhunting, and in the 1950s published two books on the subject, Hunting the Hard Way and Wild Adventure.

Early life and career Lemuel Howard Hill was born in Wilsonville, Alabama, in 1899, the youngest of Mary E. (née Crumpton) and John F. Hill's nine children. Growing up on a cotton farm, Howard learned how to use various tools, along with weapons of all types, including bows and arrows that his father made for him and his four older brothers. Later, when Howard attended Shelby County High School in nearby Columbiana, he proved to be an exceptional athlete in a variety of other sports, including baseball, basketball, football, and golf. On September 12, 1918, during World War I, he registered for the United States military, but the war ended just two months later, so he never entered the service. On his draft card, he signed his name "Howard H. Hill", indicating that he had altered his full name, adding a middle "H" and dropping his first name Lemuel, as it is documented in the federal census of 1910.

Following his graduation from high school, Hill enrolled at age 19 at Auburn Polytechnic Institute (now Auburn University), where he continued to play baseball, football, and basketball. He completed two years of study at Auburn, paying his tuition and living costs at school with money he earned giving archery lessons during summer vacations. Later, after getting married in 1922, Hill and his wife moved to Florida. There he found employment as a machinist with a division of Hughes Tool Company, and he also played semi-pro baseball on the side. Soon, his growing involvement working in Hollywood films as an archery expert, stuntman, and adviser prompted the Hills to move to Los Angeles, California, where by 1940 they owned a home at 12007 Saticoy Street and Howard identified his full-time occupation then as a performer or "Artist" in motion pictures. The next year he exhibited his expertise with the bow in Follow the Arrow, a short film that includes a skeet-shooting contest between Hill and a marksman armed with a shotgun.

Performing Hill enjoyed the challenge of making remarkably difficult trick shots, such as shooting an apple or prune off the top of someone's head from a distance of 60 feet. After accomplishing that, he would perform the same bow-and-arrow stunt with an even smaller item from a greater distance. He produced several short documentaries that highlighted other difficult trick shots. Some others included hitting a small coin flipped into the air and splitting a wooden ball in half while it was rolled across the ground. He would also perform difficult shots standing on one leg or while lying on the ground and holding the bow with his feet.

Beyond Hill's ability at trick shooting and hitting stationary targets, he demonstrated skills hunting wild game, especially with his traditional longbow. Some of his hunting trips were filmed or documented, including Howard Hill vs. Lion and Howard Hill vs. Elephant. The marksmanship that Hill exhibits in just those two films exemplify why many archers consider him to be among the greatest hunters of all time. In 2006, cast members of the Australian-American television series MythBusters were unable to replicate the end-to-end splitting of an arrow, so they concluded that Hill probably used a shaft made of bamboo, not wood, for the famous shot.

Byron Ferguson, a renowned bowhunter himself and a trick-shot expert, was able to perfectly split an arrow lengthwise using a modern laminated longbow, a shot that was filmed for the television special Extreme Marksmen and broadcast on the History Channel in 2008. Byron Ferguson, however, did not split a wooden arrow but telescoped a modern aluminum arrow into another. The aluminum and carbon-fiber arrow shafts used by modern archers are more consistent and straighter than wood arrows, making for more consistent shots. That makes Hill's feat truly impressive since he used only cedar wood arrows. Hill had designed and used specially made aluminum shafts to hunt African elephants for his full-length color film Tembo (1951).

The splitting-the-arrow scene in The Adventures of Robin Hood is explained by Hollywood stuntman Buster Wiles in his 1988 book My Days With Errol Flynn. In it Wiles reveals that although Hill had split the end off of several arrows, he was unable to split the arrow exactly as scripted (from end-to-end). Finally, a specially constructed arrow with a large bladed head was used and shot at the target arrow along a concealed wire. Nevertheless, Hill's accuracy was otherwise so precise that he routinely hit extremely small targets in both live and filmed demonstrations.

You Bet Your Life On February 17, 1955, Hill appeared as a contestant on You Bet Your Life, a popular American quiz series hosted on both radio and television by comedian Groucho Marx. In that televised broadcast, Hill describes the most challenging trick shot he ever performed and also briefly discusses his experiences hunting elephants with a bow and arrow. According to some historical accounts, the Anglo-Saxon king, Harold II, died in the fighting after being "struck in the eye" by a Norman arrow.

Personal life and death On October 31, 1922, he married Elizabeth Hodges, a native of Ashville, Alabama, who was his former high-school English teacher. They remained together for 53 years, until Howard's death at age 75 in February 1975. His gravesite is located in the Ashville Cemetery in St. Clair County, Alabama.

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