Large, colorful tents have begun popping up around the landscape of Hattiesburg, Petal, and the like. That can only mean one thing – another firework season is upon us as we move closer to the Fourth of July. But how did we get to this point? Who thought, let’s fill this cardboard cylinder with some strange concoction that will explode and put a fuse in it? KA-BOOM!
People from around the world have been celebrating with fireworks for at least 2,000 years. It was only during modern times, the 1830s, that modern fireworks were invented.
In the beginning, it appears all roads lead to China when a small accident led to the creation of fireworks. Totally unintentional, someone tossed bamboo into a fire, which due to the air pockets in the hollow bamboo, expanded and exploded. And the rest is history.
Another thousand years would go by before real fireworks came to be when an alchemist, around 800 AD, mixed sulfur, charcoal and potassium nitrate, a food preservative, hoping to discover the secret to eternal life. Boy, was he in for a surprise! What he got, instead, was the birth of gunpowder, when the mixture was set ablaze. When he packed the gunpowder into a hollow bamboo shoot and lit it on fire – crash, boom, bam!
Happy New Year! Happy Fourth of July! Happy Anything Requiring Loud Noises! Fireworks!
Back then, fireworks, which were used to scare off evil spirits, promote prosperity, and celebrate life’s milestones – weddings and births, had no color, and were simply thrown into a fire for their pops and crackles.
When the US of A started celebrating with fireworks around 1777, they were orange, just orange. No Yankee Doodle Dandy stars and stripes, red, white, or blue anywhere.
Using the gunpowder, still somewhat in its infancy, the military took to making rocket cannons to blast at their enemies. But, aside from the battlefield, the gunpowder led to the first aerial fireworks, which made their way around the globe, becoming bigger and more elaborate.
In the 1600s, fireworks became much more entertaining and quite colorful. If you’ve ever wondered why we celebrate Independence Date with fireworks, thank the British and John Adams. Two days before the Declaration of Independence was signed, he penned a letter to his wife:
“This day will be most memorable in the history of America,” he predicted. “I am apt to
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