50th time’s the charm: Sherwood archers beat Nottingham, England; add a new trophy

Published 11:17 am Thursday, July 24, 2025

Not only did archers participating in Sherwood’s annual Robin Hood Festival Association International Archery Match retain their longtime winning status, but they unveiled a new traveling trophy in the process.

Competition scores from the July 19 and 20 competition held at Sherwood High School showed that Sherwood bested their counterparts from Nottingham, England — 12,585 to 12,468 — in the one-of-a-kind competition that has been ongoing since 1956.

For Sherwood, it was the archers’ 50th win.

Nottingham has won only 18 times

The unusual part of the competition, sponsored by the Sylvan Archers, is that neither members of the Sherwood team, nor those from Nottingham, ever meet face-to-face.

“They (Nottingham) shoot in May and June, two different dates. We shoot on the same weekend (each year),” said Sandy Wallace, Robin Hood Festival archery chair.

Nottingham then mails the scores to Sherwood.

For the record, Nottingham has won the archery contest only 18 times, and Sherwood has held onto the winning bowl since 1991.

However, this year, a new trophy was introduced — a traveling silver bowl plaque that will replace the engraved Tiffany silver bowl if it needs to be sent across the pond in the future.

Silver Tiffany bowl will continue to be displayed

What that means is that Sherwood will hang onto the new trophy, along with the Tiffany silver bowl that hasn’t been engraved with the name of a winner in years.

“The bowl was engraved up until 1976 and then the curvature of it did not allow it anymore,” said Wallace, who remembers a 1983 trip with her late husband, Bill, to England where they were introduced to the sheriff of Nottingham. The sheriff’s position, which historically has been tied to law and order, as well as from Robin Hood lore, is now entirely ceremonial.

Wallace, who along with Bill began heading up the competition in 1975, said she personally recalls having to send the bowl over to Nottingham twice. It was returned twice as well.

However, once the bowl took about nine months to show up in Sherwood after it was mailed, and it returned a bit damaged.

“At our board festival in February, I brought up the idea of what would they think of retiring the silver bowl,” Wallace said. “I wrote a letter to the Nottinghamshire Archery Society, who represents Nottingham, and the Sylvan Archers. Both replies were positive, so we went forward and had the plaque made up.”

The result was a 12-inch-by-15-inch wooden plaque with the same Robin-Hood-in-a-forest image that is engraved on the silver bowl.

But not to worry, the public will still be able to see the Tiffany bowl, which is kept in a bank vault for most of the year, at all future Robin Hood Festival archery contests.