Iron Mountain Barn

Fall Archery Hunt with Ann Clark and Debbie Ohl

After last nights cool front here in Arkansas, its finally fall. It feels amazing outside this morning. There are lots of fall posts on social media and people gearing up for fall photo sessions as well as fall hunting seasons that are getting underway. In celebration, I felt like I needed to post a fall photo or two to social media. As I was going through fall photos to share, I’ve got plenty of fall landscape photos but they say one of the keys to improving your landscape photography is placing people in your images. Although I didn’t know her long, this lady is one of my people. Her name is Ann Clark.

Who was Ann Clark?

In the fall of 2015, I got to meet Ann when I was asked to film a deer hunt with “some old lady” in Arkansas. I’m pretty sure those were the exact words Bill first used to describe her in the first phone call. His old high school basketball coach Arden Chapman had set the hunt up and the story of how that all happened is pretty involved on its own but Bills first words were pretty honest after all since she was 90 something at the time. I honestly didn’t know who she was at the time either. I had to google her. Sorry Mrs Ann.

I soon learned that Ann was one of the pioneers of the outdoor industry. She was one of the first of what we would now call a “pro staff” member of an outdoor company. She is a founding member of the Archery Hall of Fame. Her display cases are one of the first things you see when you walk into the museum at the Bass Pro Shop in Springfield MO. Long before names like Michael Waddell, Jim Shockey, or Eva Shockey or for that matter any of the other big names in the modern outdoor hunting industry were even born, Ann Clark was paving the way. Her contemporaries were mostly men like Fred Bear, Ben Pearson or Earl and Ann Hoyt.

Ann said she got started in archery when she and her former husband started a sporting goods store in Cincinnati, OH called Clark’s Archery and Sports Center. They didn’t have all of the archery options that we have to day so her husband tried to make a long bow fit her by cutting a section off of both ends to make it shorter and shorten the draw length. She said it was like shooting a broom stick. It’s a wonder she kept shooting but she did. And she got good too.

Its a Mental Game

Ann Clark became a competitive archery shooter as well as a bow hunter. She told me she had seen in various publications that Ann Webber Hoyt from Hoyt Archery was the person to beat. She was good and was winning all of the matches. At her first big match she found out she was going to be standing on the shooting line next to Ann Hoyt. Ann Hoyt was very intimidating, but in the middle of that match Ann Clark realized that she wasn’t competing against Ann Hoyt she was competing against herself. She said “Archery is a mental game and I couldn’t allow myself to be distracted by how Ann Hoyt or anyone else was shooting, I had to focus on my own target. The scores of Ann Hoyt or other competitors didn’t matter. It was only my personal score that mattered.”

Mic drop, que the music. Let me re-state that so the world can hear it again. It doesn’t matter what anyone else is doing. You focus on you and being the best person that you can be. You can’t change other people you can only change you. You can’t worry about how many likes, shares, or comments someone else gets. You have to focus on you. It doesn’t matter how much money someone else makes. You have to focus on you. I wish today’s world could get that. You can’t even worry about who else has the vaccine that’s all over the news today. All you have to worry about is you and being the best person you can be.

I can’t remember for sure if she said she’d beaten Ann Hoyt in that first match but Ann Clark scored the highest score she’d ever achieved that day. The two Anns became the closest of friends after that day. I believe they actually lived together for a while in their later years before Ann Hoyt Passed away.

As I mentioned before, She became a pro staffer for Ben Pearson Archery. Ben Pearson Archery was one of the first companies to market themselves with pro staff members. It was especially unique to have a woman like Ann Clark doing the job, but she did it well.

She toured sports shows as she called them and did archery exhibitions in schools and other events all over the country. Here she demonstrates how she used to shoot a balloon from an assistant’s mouth. Can you imagine? She said she stopped doing this when a student popped a popcorn bag right before she shot. No one was ever hurt in her performances but she said she didn’t need that kind of excitement anymore.

She had spunk like few others that I have known. I got to film her last two hunts with her before she passed away. She had moved to a crossbow instead of her traditional archery equipment. But she could still hunt.

Hunt at Longbow

For the first of the two hunts we would be hunting at the historic Long Bow Resort in Prim, Arkansas. It would be a fitting hunt since this property was originally her friend Ben Person’s farm and is now owned and operated by his son Ben Person Jr. Its a beautiful property with some of the coolest cabins and waterfalls and especially that fall, it was some of the best fall color I’ve ever seen.

We met Ann and her daughter Debbie at the Little Rock airport. A representative from the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission was there to personally present Mrs Ann with her hunting license. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never had that happen to me. For a lot of people, if a representative from the Game and Fish commission is there, someone has some questions to answer. Mrs Ann though was plumb royalty and it was proof that we were hunting with the Queen bee of archery.

After a short stop at Mikes Place in Conway, for dinner, we made our way on up to Prim, Arkansas where we arrived at longbow resort and were met by Ben Pearson Jr. Lots of old stories were told among these old friends as we toured the property and got situated in our cabins.

Rainy weather settled in the next morning and for most of our hunt. Ann and Debbie were staying in their own cabin and well before daylight we went to pick her up for our morning hunt. When we pulled up, Mrs Ann was already standing outside in the rain when we arrived waiting on us. She was ready. After quite a long sit that morning, we hadn’t seen much but squirrels, Mrs Ann mentioned that she needed to take a break and visit the little girls room. Bill and I trying to be gentleman and me thinking of my own 90 year old grandmother, I said I would run and get the UTV and get her back to the cabin and end the hunt for the morning. She looked at Bill and I and said, no honey, if you’ll just help me get our of this blind, I’ll walk into the woods behind the blind.

Yes Ma’am. And she did. A few minutes later, she came back to the blind and we hunted in the rain for a couple more hours. I know a lot of women these days who would not have done that. Heck, I was ready to end the hunt myself after several ours in the cold rain and not seeing much. Mrs. Ann was not average.

Bill and I cooked dinner for everyone the next night and somehow during conversation, the subject of dancing came up. In my past, I had learned to west cost swing dance. Upon hearing this, the next thing I know Debbie has pulled out her phone a turned on some music. She wanted to learn. I don’t claim to be the best dancer in the world but I showed Debbi a little and then Mrs Ann was not going to let her daughter out do her so I got to twirl Mrs Ann around the floor a few rounds. I swear I’m not making this stuff up. If you know them I’m telling you these ladies are a lot of fun to be around and it’s obvious that with Debbie, the acorn did not fall far from the tree.

Although we hunted hard, we did not get a chance to take a deer with her. However, Bill Petrus has a camp at Davis island in Louisiana which is know for some great white tail deer action. Mrs. Ann and debbie would be visiting family in Louisiana for Thanksgiving so we invited them to make another hunt with us in Louisiana at that time.

Louisiana Hunt at Davis Island

Now Bills show is called T.P. Outdoors Adventures. If you’ve never hunted an island on the mighty Mississippi river, just getting there can be a much bigger adventure than most people ever experience. Fluctuating river levels mean sometimes you can boat all the way in to the camp. Other times, you have to boat across a small section of the river to a sandbar and UTV the rest of the way. During the summer at low water, you can actually drive all the way. Some people even choose to fly in via helicopter or small airplane on a grass strip. It doesn’t matter if you have the nicest equipment, there are always equipment breakdowns in getting there. (although hopefully not with aircraft)

This trip would be boating part way and UTVing across the sandbar and a mile or two on back to the camp. However, it was cold and the wind was howling. The water level was to high to drive in, but almost to low to boat in. Still Mrs Ann and Mrs Debbie loaded up into a boat and were ready for the adventure.

Now remember we are trying to get 6 people including a 90 year old lady plus a dog across the Mississippi river via boat in a blowing late November cold front. After some trouble getting the boat all the way to the sand bar, Mrs Ann still had not had enough adventure so she and Bill set off doing donuts on the massive dunes of the Mississippi river sandbar in the UTV like kids on spring break. We then got everyone loaded up and headed to the camp for the hunt.

Davis island gets its name because in the 1800’s this was part of Jefferson Davis’s family plantation. Currently the island is not owned by one individual but is divided into a small handful of hunting clubs and some private individuals. It’s known for some incredible whitetail hunting due to its habitat created by the Mississippi flood plain. But even with the best habitat and genetics, If deer aren’t allowed to reach maturity you’ll never have a quality deer heard. Davis Island has all of the above due to very strict harvest policies designed to allow deer to reach maturity.

For this hunt in particular, we would be hunting on some private land. The land owner was willing to allow us to take a deer for Mrs Ann that didn’t quite make the normal criteria in the adjacent clubs given the circumstances of the hunt. He had one exception. We could not shoot one deer that he estimated to be 4 1/2 years old. He had been watching this deer and wanted to see what he was as a 5 1/2 year old which was the typical criteria.

The night before our hunt, Bill Petrus and I left to go setup a blind for the next mornings hunt. When we got to the area, we walked through the woods with just a dim light and we could hear the most awful crashing and clanging racket in the direction we were headed. Not 50 yards in front of us, there were two bucks going at it. It was the fight of the century and they could care less that we were even there. Other deer moved about watching the action and we watched for a minute before they finaly moved away. We were sure the next morning would be good.

A little after daylight we noticed a deer coming our direction. It was a good deer. Mrs Ann looked at Bill eager for him to hand her her crossbow, but Mrs Ann wasn’t aware of the deer on our no shoot list. He had to make sure this wasn’t the deer. We watched him come all the way in and stand there for what seemed like forever presenting the perfect shot for Mrs Ann to take. She was looking at us and the deer wondering just how big the deer have to get to shoot down here and knowing she could easily take the shot but Bill never handed her the bow. He was all but positive this was the deer on our don’t shoot list.

Bill took pictures of the deer and tried his best to send it to the land owner for verification or approval to shoot. However cell service is very spotty on the remote island. The txt messages wouldn’t go through. Knowing how many deer there were on the island and yet being unsure about this specific deer, Bill couldn’t give the green light to shoot. He never handed Mrs Ann her bow.

It was truly crushing for everyone to not get to shoot this deer. Bill had given his word to the landowner so we had abide by his rules. It was a judgment call that had to be made and you have to respect that but everyone wanted Mrs Ann to be able to take this deer. Knowing the number of deer on the island, surely there would be other deer. They never came. We’d missed our opportunity to take a deer for this trip.

I’m sure she was frustrated and disappointed as were we, but she was a sportsman and understood that we had rules we had to follow even if we didn’t like them and wanted to bend them a little. We didn’t. Instead we planned to do another hunt the following year.

Future Plans

At the beginning of December of that year, I’d been working in Texas and on my way home I got a call from my dad saying that I’d received a package. He hadn’t opened it but had placed it inside. When I got home several hours later, I opened it and it was from Mrs Ann and Debbie. They had sent me ice cream. I’m so glad I made it home before it thawed. I had no clue you could even ship ice cream like this. We’d spoken on the phone and she wanted me to attend the next Hall Of Fame induction dinner with her. A series of events happened and I was not able to attend the dinner at the Hall of Fame Induction that year. I ended up working because honestly, I couldn’t afford to make the trip. I needed the money from work. I hoped and made plans to make the dinner the next year and spoke to her and Debbie frequently on the phone and through e-mail and social media in the mean time.

The bible says in Proverbs 16:9 “The heart of man plans his way, but the LORD establishes his steps.” Even though we’d made plans God had different plans. You and I are not entitled to tomorrow. Mrs Ann passed away due to a heart attack before the next years hunt or the Hall of Fame Dinner. Not making that dinner with her or getting her a deer was one of my bigger regrets in life.

Mrs Ann’s words about shooting and focusing on your own target ring true on so many levels. Each and everyone of us will have to stand before God and answer for our actions one day. Being raised in church won’t save you, having Godly parents won’t save you. Having others pray for you won’t help you either. Being a good person won’t save you because we all have failed at some point. One sin requires punishment. But Jesus Christ made a way that each and every one of us can follow him and place our full faith in him and just like when Mrs Ann was greeted at the airport terminal by the game and fish commission, Jesus Stands waiting on us to accept him as he vouches for us before Holy God saying She’s with me. He’s one of mine. Come with me. It helps to know people but you have to focus on your own target. If you have any questions about this, feel free to contact me.

Every fall since our hunts in 2015, I’ve thought of Mrs Ann and Debbie and the fun we had on these hunts. I still try to stay in touch with Debbie and think of them often. But until we meet again, Mrs Ann, “I’ll see you at the Hall of Fame.”

Your Friend;

Chris Porter