The Fourth of July got me thinking about fireworks and my childhood. I wonder whether personal fireworks have changed much.I think they must have. I went out on my porch a couple of times and witnessed a few small occasional quick displays. Nothing like when I dabbled in the trade. We had all sorts, some fun and all very dangerous.

In the Rocketry category we had your usual bottle rockets, which you bought wholesale by the gross. These were the smallest rockets. Then you had your larger ones, these were cool but dangerous. They came in the 4oz, 6oz and 8oz category and could reach hundreds of feet in the air before their display. I saw none of these. Probably a good thing. There were propeller type flying objects called Silver Jets and just plain helicopters.

In the explosive category we had the usual fire crackers which one would purchaseby the "Brick". I think that was eighty-one packs, or by the matt which was one long buch of hundreds of firecrackers. The matt is still used for I have seen these around Chinese New Year celebrations. OK, now for the big one's. We had M80's, which back then sounded as loud as a flash bang grenade. Cherry bombs, the round version of the M80. Then there is the "Block Buster". Actually, an industrial explosive, about the equivalent of a half of stick of dynamite. They were called "pineapples."

I remember going on Vacation to the southern US and going into the stores in the states where they were legal. I lived in New York. I was lucky to have cool parents who bought and smuggled them back for me. That vacation I came back with many Fireworks and coconuts(from Miami). Then there was the time my click and I figured that we could go down to China Town in the winter and get fireworks from Little Italy which was next store. We drove the cops crazy that winter.

For safety purposes I suppose they have changed. I miss them though, all of them. I forgot to mention the Roman Candles, They're still around. As you can tell, I could just keep going. Can't forget the Smoke bombs.