"The straps tied under the strings always make me cringe- it always makes me feel that a person might lean too heavily on the box and cause bowing of the neck..."

Believe me ~ not a problem. In fact, I find it hard to imagine it possible to "lean heavily" on the body of an instrument strapped to one's own body.

I have a 42-year-old Martin dread (D-18) that I've owned for all 42 years, have always positioned my strap in the customary manner for which the guitar was designed (i.e., without that second button), and have always performed standing up (because I'm relatively serious about singing).

I had the neck reset a couple of years ago to lower the action; years of string-tension can draw the head-end of the fingerboard straight up a fraction of an inch, but I don't believe there's any real physical possibility of bending a guitar neck sideways in the manner you seem to fear.

I've always been happy enough with the left-hand or "upper" end of my strap tied to the headstock. I'm pretty sure that was always the customary arrangement prior to Les Paul's development of the solid-body electric guitar, which is of course much heavier, and very much more bottom-heavy, than the acoustic instrument.

I suppose it's all just a manner of the style to which one is accustomed. Players who started on the electric instrument, especially, are likely to have become accustomed to having the strap attached to the body at both ends, with the neck waving free, so to speak. I am less comfortable playing a guitar with both ends of the strap attached to the body, so I can well understand that a person with different experience feeling equally uncomfortable the other way 'round. Each to his own, eh?

However, I'm a bit taken aback that anyone would feel that the traditional arrangement is "SOOO uncool." Is this a British thing, or what? Here in the US, most owner/operators of acoustic Gibsons and Martins, etc., are perfectly OK with the old-school strap arrangement designed into their single-strap-button instruments.

At any rate, for those of you contemplating installation of a strap button without first reading the good advice available at frets.com, BE SURE TO SCREW INTO THICK SOLID WOOD, not just into the thin soundwood of your guitar's side or back -- and ideally through the side and into the block inside your soundbox rather than into the base of the neck. And drill a pilot hole first, of course...