please empty your brain below
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Wonderful description, ours used to be similar. I managed to set the grass alight in my neighbours garden, in my rush to put it out, I knocked a decorative concrete block into his pond containing his large expensive carp nearly killing one!
Nick | 06.11.15 - 7:24 a.m. | #
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Does anyone else remember 'Indoor Fireworks' ? A cardboard try of tiny things that yes - you lit with a match indoors - and often it would just emit a bad smell like a fart. Can't help think that this was a 1980's thing, and would never be allowed these days...
Geofftech | 06.11.15 - 8:24 a.m. | #
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Here in the nanny state fireworks are mostly banned, and have been for over 30 years. I'm sooooooo jealous. They used to be so much fun!
Antipodean | 06.11.15 - 8:38 a.m. | #
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penny for a guy...
as a child of the seventies this time of year is rich with nostalgia and so pleased to hear that Halloween hasn't entirely trumped a small corner of my home city...
you describe beautifully a scene that could have been my back garden circa 1975 ...
thank you...
PJS | 06.11.15 - 8:42 a.m. | #
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A wooden post for the Catherine wheel; what a good idea. We nailed ours to the fence and then had the unexpected legacy of circular scorch marks ever after.
And indoor fireworks, yes. A favourite of Grandma's in the 60s. A little risky, very smelly, producing disgusting looking worms that magically appeared out of a flat piece of cardboard.
petras409 | 06.11.15 - 8:44 a.m. | #
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Yes, indoor fireworks that failed to do much and Penny for the Guy! Plus jacket potatoes in the bonfire and feeling like you were staying up so late because you were outside after dark - even though in reality it was probably only 6pm!!
We'll be doing ours at Grandparents tonight - only they've opted for a pizza delivery in order to tempt the teenage boys away from their computers, because that's modern kids for you!
Cornish Cockney | 06.11.15 - 8:54 a.m. | #
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Thanks DG, I really enjoyed reading that. It brought back memories of the old days when I had my own kids at home and still had more money than sense.
Dave | 06.11.15 - 9:13 a.m. | #
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When I enjoyed Guy Fawkes fireworks, as a child in the 1950's, I am sure the the weather was normally cold and frosty back then. As for food, as Cornish Cockney mentioned Jacket potatoes baked in the bonfire, and also baked Apples. No Pizza take-away back then, just fish and chips.So probably healthy than today's fare.
One firework that seems to have vanished due to health and safety is the Jumping Cracker, or Jumping Jack.
Children building a Guy and going out collecting a "Penny for the Guy" was a common site back then.
Now fireworks seem to be ignited for several weeks as other festivals have come to this country like Halloween and Diwali.
Nowadays I stay in and hope the weather will be breezy and blow the smoke pollution away.
John | 06.11.15 - 9:31 a.m. | #
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We don't have 5 November fireworks.
We have fireworks for old & new, a fantastic combination of drunks and fiery destruction.
But some how we manage not to kill just about everybody.
Michael | 06.11.15 - 9:32 a.m. | #
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Atmospheric.
David | 06.11.15 - 9:46 a.m. | #
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Lovely! I'm glad it still goes on, and you describe it exactly as I remember my childhood bonfire nights. We had to have jacket potatoes and sausages, and yes the Catherine wheel never worked properly! Thanks DG
AliE17 | 06.11.15 - 10:03 a.m. | #
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I remember indoor fireworks from the late 1950s. A 1 inch square of thin card with a little pellet glued in the centre. You put it on a saucer and light the pellet with a match. Vesuvius created a growing cone of ash. The Worm grew a long curling worm. The Blizzard filled the room with grey smoke full of little white flakes not much like snow. There were others but I can't remember them now. To a 7 year old they were magic.
John "Joho" Maltby | 06.11.15 - 10:04 a.m. | #
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Ah the memories you have invoked!
When suburbia actually consisted of communities the bulk of our street would gather for fireworks.
Each house would do a different food - my mum used to do the toffee apples.
It was always duffle coat weather and you could see your breath.
Happy, innocent days!
Chris | 06.11.15 - 10:17 a.m. | #
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Memories of Dad setting off such delights, with Mum carefully keeping us well away, apart from the sparklers. Then one year Mum saw a programme about various survivors of 5th November fireworks and we never had them again.
We did try a public event one year, but were far too far back in a huge crowd.
I think we've had fireworks ourselves here about once. We've watched other people's, or listened to them since. Last night, there having had very low cloud all day, I wondered how many rockets burst invisibly above the murk!
Bronchitikat | Homepage | 06.11.15 - 11:33 a.m. | #
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'.......you describe beautifully a scene that could have been my back garden circa 1975 ... '
You did indeed. Wonderful stuff. And as others have said, good to hear it still goes on for some sprogs and adults.
Auntie Doris | 06.11.15 - 11:41 a.m. | #
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Made me laugh until I cried (almost...)
South London Lad | 06.11.15 - 1:47 p.m. | #
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And those 'penny for the guy' merchants - fine your entrepreneurs, probably now running the banks. Each year they began earlier and earlier, at least in Hackney.
The guys were uniformly awful - even the better ones were just cushions, rather too-good shoes and an old coat Mum or Dad wouldn't miss, or not until it was too late. 'Penny' became 'tanner' became 'shilling' - pleading became polite demanding, and the occasional swearing when the donor hadn't supplied an arm's or leg's-worth of loot.
Most of it was good fun, and the ultimate, a dodgy unsafe petrol-fuelled bonfire with a 'guy' on top - still in that coat - not so sure about the shoes...
Joel | 06.11.15 - 1:55 p.m. | #
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Thank you thank you DG - a truly wonderful and accurate account of my childhood fireworks parties. We took in our stride the occasion when a stray spark set off all the fireworks at once - "That was a good one" said my mother brightly - but ever afterwards the fireworks were kept in a tin trunk for safety. Also used to ignite small fireworks in batches - too boring one by one.
Westville 13 | 06.11.15 - 2:44 p.m. | #
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Great article DG, reminded me of childhood bonfire nights in Lancashire, at Preston and at Lytham, where there were three rival bonfires on the sea front, the builders of which used to raid each others woodpiles, so it was always a toss up to see which bonfire was biggest on the day.
In those days Halloween was a gleam in a marketing man's eye, but we had a Halloween lantern on the 5th November, carved out of a turnip.We used to enjoy parkin and treacle toffee with the fireworks, but perhaps that's just a Northern thing. And, yes, we too had indoor fireworks, but usually at Christmas if I remember correctly.
Tony (Somerset) | 06.11.15 - 3:16 p.m. | #
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Oh so different to the "fireworks" in central London last night...
Working Class Hero | 06.11.15 - 4:23 p.m. | #
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Oh how I envy you DG. Just like Aussieland, here in Montgomery County Maryland USA it is illegal to use any kind of fireworks, including sparklers. This sure puts a crimp on 4th of July celebrations.
Colesville Garth | 06.11.15 - 4:28 p.m. | #
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We usually had fireworks at home, but went to a display one year - at the fire station.
..........where a stray spark set off a lot of them at once, including a few groundscraping rockets!
I expect one of the fire brigade organisers got a rocket for that!
timbo | 06.11.15 - 5:25 p.m. | #
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@ geofftech and others:
http://www.indoorfireworks.co.uk
NLW | 06.11.15 - 6:38 p.m. | #
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What a happy and memorable occasion for you, DG. It set me thinking about the time when we lived on half an acre, so had plenty of room to celebrate in style with a clapped-out sofa on a base of dry wood, and a magnificent guy sitting on the sofa with jumping jacks stuffed down his trousers.
Great Aunt Annie | 06.11.15 - 8:40 p.m. | #
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We got parkin specially imported (to North London) from Grandma in Yorkshire. Just gingerbread with bits in really, but it seemed so exotically named!
Malcolm | 06.11.15 - 9:40 p.m. | #
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Remember those 'bangers'. Put them under a tin seaside bucket and they would blow the bottom out. Light the fuse and then drop them into the local canal to act as mini depth charges. Tape them onto rockets, light both fuses at the same time and fire them off into someone else's property.
And we didn't think it was at all dangerous...
popartist | 06.11.15 - 9:45 p.m. | #
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@Tony (Somerset) - a lantern made from a hollowed-out turnip is sometimes described as a turnip-ghost - see http://jackofkent.com/2015/10/what-is-a-turnip-ghost-a-post-for-halloween/
Andrew | 07.11.15 - 3:19 p.m. | #
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What a memory-provoking post DG. For me only missing the massive bonfire, built over the previous weeks and causing the gathered crowd to stay later and drink more!
Thank you. As Antipodean says, it's forbidden here. We are missing out.
Sally | 09.11.15 - 7:21 p.m. | #
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