Many historians believe that fireworks originally were developed in the second century B.C. in ancient Liuyang, China. It is believed that the first natural “firecrackers” were bamboo stalks that when thrown in a fire, would explode with a bang because of the overheating of the hollow air pockets in the bamboo.
The day I left Alabama, I stopped by a Fireworks Supermarket to purchase a holiday gift for my grandson. I have reservations about this gift, just as I had reservations about purchasing a nerf gun in the shape of an automatic rifle. I’ve never owned a gun and do not hunt with a gun. I’m horrified by gun violence. “Is the nerf gun really a toy alternative to an AR-15?” I asked myself. This summer I engaged in nerf gun battles with the grandson to revive my memory of playing “war” as a child. With this urge to buy fireworks, is my intention to reignite my early childhood memories of playing with danger? Will it lead to injury and violence? Will it temper his urge to cause harm?
Here in this Fireworks Supermarket, I’m surrounded by stacks of explosives, their danger obscured by colorful (gothic) graphics. I serpentine through the large aisles of product that ranges from $5 for to $999 for a casket-sized package of explosives. Most of the fireworks are packaged in car battery-sized box kits that sell between $49.99 to $99.99. Most have exotic names and designs: Intensity, Loud and Roudy, Voo doo Magic, Gone Wild, Dungeons of Doom, Color Me Bad and Rolled Gold. I encountered fireworks in my early years as Black Cat Firecrackers and Cherry Bombs, but nothing on the scale of the packaging I see here.
Is there a primal urge to have and ignite explosives when people often feel excited by the loud blasts and the spray sparks in the night sky. The visual effects can be quite spectacular. It’s part of a long American tradition on the fourth of July and signifies, since the signing of the Declaration if Independence, the declaration of separation of the 13 states from England, which marks the beginning of long and bloody battles.
I have flashbacks to being ten, crouched over a sandbox, striking a match on a matchbook, lighting the fuse of a pack of Black Jacks and tossing it into an imaginary battlefield of miniature soldiers. I run like hell before the whole pack explodes. Then I return to the smoke of gunfire, the smell of sulfur, survey the blast site, assess the damage to the plastic arms and legs before I began again to rebuild the fort In the sandbox battlefield.
So here I am, entering into a Megastore to discover an unlimited supply of fireworks available to the general public, 16 years and older. A clearly marked warning appears on all the boxes: ILLEGAL IN MOST STATE. The dangers are clearly understood and ignored:
Fireworks are considered illegal in many places due to the significant risk of injury and property damage they pose when mishandled by consumers, including potential fires, burns, and even blindness, leading to safety concerns and regulations that often restrict their sale and use to professional displays only; laws vary by location, with some states allowing limited types of fireworks while others completely ban them.
Consumer fireworks that can be purchased in most states include Roman candles, sparklers, poppers, snakes, helicopters, ground spinners, and multiple-tube fireworks. They must have fewer than 50mg of gunpowder and follow some other regulations. Additionally, the fuses on consumer fireworks have to burn for at least three seconds but no more than nine seconds, to help ensure that they do not explode in the face of the person who is lighting them.
December 25, 2024 Ithaca, New York