I’ve mellowed with age, as most of us do. This type of fireworks viewership doesn’t exactly jive with parenthood, for example. Plus, I like to hear sounds the other 364 days of the year, too, so I am now more mindful of the hearing damage that level of noise can cause. Farther away is preferable now.
But the summer I turned 16, I considered it necessary to be as close to the action as possible. I wanted to feel the fireworks rather than merely see them. So a friend and I made our way toward the big, yellow tent that preceded today’s steel pavilion. We were ready for a show.
As most long-term Duluthians might have already guessed, based on the trajectory of this story, I turned 16 in 1988. I saw a show, all right.
For those of you newer to Duluth, 1988 was the year our city fireworks display accidentally detonated en masse on the ground. In what was later reported to be a fluke accident, a dud shell went off about 10 minutes into the show and somehow found its way under a tarp where the yet-unused fireworks were stored. All the remaining fireworks exploded over the course of a minute. It was an incredible display of power.
Watching video clips of the accident now, it seems so clear what was happening, even seconds into the chaos. But up close in real time, it took an unreasonably long time to grasp the seriousness of the situation. At first, myself and most of the people around me seemed to think that ground fireworks were something new. Just part of the show. We oohed and aahed. Then a larger explosion occurred, one that we could feel deep in our chests, and we spent more precious seconds simply being confused. A few people still cheered.
Hot sparks were raining down on the crowd before anyone so much as moved. I do have memories of the people in front of me screaming and turning to run, but honestly, the stampede didn’t last long. By the time we all realized we should probably get the heck out of there, the explosions were over.
The next day, people still didn’t know what to make of the incident. In back-to-back sentences, Northland television legend Dennis Anderson called the event both a “fireworks mishap” and a “spectacular accident.” Other newscasters used words like “inferno” and “Armageddon,” but most of the adults around me seemed ready to put it out of their minds. I found a burn on my forearm that was so small, I hadn’t even noticed it the night before. I still carried on a bit when my parents pronounced it “nothing to worry about,” but eventually even I was able to soldier on.
The fact that no one had been killed or even badly injured perhaps caused people to take the whole situation more lightly than they would have otherwise. Plus, it was the ’80s. Back then, we didn’t take anything too seriously.
I’ve often wondered why the memory of fire raining down as people ran screaming didn’t scar me more than it did, but the next year, I was right back in the front row at Bayfront where, strange but true, they had yet another incident of embers making their way onto the crowd. I’m telling you: 1980s Duluthians were a slap-happy bunch. Some might even say nonchalant to a fault.
Regardless of the rocky start, I have enjoyed decades worth of fireworks since then. I’ve lived in big cities with impressive displays, and small towns with a $500 fireworks budget. I’ve oohed and aahed at them all. But I have to admit: I will never stop comparing them to the fireworks I felt the summer I turned 16.
Kathleen Murphy is a freelance writer who lives and works in Duluth. Write to her at kmurphywrites@gmail.com.
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Kathleen Murphy column: The Fourth of July when sparks really flew - Duluth News Tribune
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