Pitchypine: I learned to use my calf against the lower limb, in stringing it, but learned to do it this way. Put your leg through the bow, and brace the lower limb against your calf, while the point of the lower limb is held against the instep of your other foot. Then use your hand to hold the upper limb in the middle of the limb, fingers pointing toward the top point. Use the palm and butt of your hand to push down and in towards your body to flex the lower limb, while your finger are pushing down to flex the upper limb enough to slip the string into the nock. The idea is to flex the two limbs equally. Its really not all that hard to learn to do.
Of course, today's archers, with their compound bows, are wedded to their archery shops, where they get them checked, restrung, maintained, etc. and never ever learn how to string the bow themselves. I don't fault people for using the pulleys and wheels bows, but I just think how much they are missing when they use them. When I see men putting scopes on a bow, I leave before my mouth says something I will regret.
I do have a couple of recurves, and one compound bow a friend insisted on giving me to use when we hunted carp in the ditches around tound in late May and June. It was good training for still hunting deer later in the year. It was also a surprise to learn how big the fish can be in these drainage ditches.
