Hoyt Archery is a hunting and archery brand headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah. It was founded in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1931.
The first true bow stabilizer came out of a St. Louis shop that started in 1931 making cedar arrows. That shop became Hoyt, now based in Salt Lake City. Earl Hoyt Sr. ran it with his son, Earl Jr., who quit an aircraft company job about 15 years in to join full time. Bowhunter credits Earl Jr. with that stabilizer and the first micro-adjustable arrow rest.
The best archer in the family may not have been an Earl. Ann Weber Hoyt, who married into the family, won the 1959 world championship and entered the Archery Hall of Fame in 1972. Earl Jr. followed in 1977.
Jas. D. Easton Inc. bought Hoyt in 1983, and the company moved to Salt Lake City one department at a time. It is still an Easton family division, and its bows have won Olympic medals since 1972. Doug Denton, Hoyt's recurve manager, told KSL that from 70 meters the best archers put every arrow inside the size of a grapefruit.
Every bow is built on site in a 150,000 square foot building near the Salt Lake City airport, which has its own archery lane so the people who make the bows can shoot them.
Sylvester Stallone carried a Hoyt/Spectra bow in Rambo: First Blood Part II and again in Rambo III.
