OUR LAGUNA: Fourth of July goes with pyrotechnics

Fireworks are nothing new in Laguna. Neither are the pyrotechnics that celebrate the Fourth of July.

Laguna’s traditional show is scheduled to begin about 9 p.m. at Monument Point in Heisler Park. Emerald Bay and Three Arch Bay displays also will be lighting up the South Coast skies and from some high spots in town, the display at Dana Point and some communities to the north can be seen.

“When I was a kid, we did our own fireworks on the beach at El Morro, where my family had a trailer for 50 years,” Mayor Pro Tem Cheryl Kinsman said. “It’s just not the Fourth of July without fireworks.”

Get to the park early if you want to get as close as possible to the shooting site.

“We need 70-to-100 feet of clear space per inch of shell,” Fire Chief Mike Macey said. “We use a five-inch shell so we need a circumference of 500 feet to prevent fall-out [the burning debris] from landing on people or structures. We also aim the fireworks toward the water.

“Laguna’s fireworks used to be shot at Main Beach, but the tides would come in and it would get pushed up closer to the highway and eventually we ran out of space to do the show.”

The fire department issues the permit for the show and monitors it for safety. One year the winds were not favorable and the department fired a test round before permitting the show to go on.

If you do drive downtown or up into the hills for a better view, plan to hang around a while. The show is a big tourist draw, and traffic is a bear.

“It normally takes two hours to get out of town, even with two outbound lanes opened on Laguna Canyon Road,” City Manager Ken Frank said.

Police Chief Mike Sellers said estimates of the crowd that jams Laguna ranges from as many a as 75,000 to 100,000 people.

“It is the largest event in the city,” Sellers said. “The key is that by 7:30 p.m., there is little vehicle movement on Coast Highway.”

The majority of sworn and unsworn police personnel will be on duty from Thursday to Monday.

“And that means the command staff, including me, will be out there,” Sellers said.

The fireworks cost the city about $20,000 a year, which resident Bruce Hopping says every year is too many bucks for the bang.

“I think there are so many other projects [the council] could use it for,” Hopping said. “We could use it for a Fourth of July event at the festival with people dressed up in Revolutionary War costumes and bring history to this area.”

If pets could talk, they probably would share Hopping’s proposal.

“It is not uncommon for pets to freak on the Fourth of July,” Animal Shelter volunteer Synthia Scofield said. “We have a flier here that advises pet owners to keep their animals inside, as far away from noise as possible.

“Also make sure the pets have identification tags, just in case they do get away. One year, we had a dog jump through a window — with the glass in it.

“If you know the fireworks will make your dog nervous, talk to your vet about a tranquilizer. It’s not a bad idea to start the pill the day before. This goes for cats, too.”

Nonetheless, fireworks on the Fourth are firmly entrenched in the American psyche. They have been part of the Independence Day celebrations since 1777.

But the celebration is actually two days late, according to the Encyclopedia of Britannica, my “go to” for this kind of information, Luddite that I am.

The Declaration of Independence was drafted on July 4, but it was the justification for the resolution approved by the Continental Congress on July 2 that formally cut the last tie to Britain. Who knew?

Six days later the declaration was read to the public outside the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia.

To say the break with Britain caused fireworks would be like saying Councilwoman Toni Iseman is not fond of dump trucks carrying exported soil through town.

The first anniversary of the Fourth of July was celebrated in Philadelphia by adjourning Congress, a ceremonial dinner, bonfires, ringing bells and, yes, fireworks.

Other cities and states climbed on the bandwagon and began to celebrate the anniversary with parades — military displays, patriotic oratory and of course, fireworks.

Naturally, Laguna marches to a slightly different drummer, holding its Patriots Day Parade in March, but the Fourth is a bang-up celebration with the fireworks, picnics and the Community Concert Band’s Americana Concert at the Sawdust Festival.

However, fireworks have been around a lot longer than the Declaration of Independence.

Britannica posits that fireworks might have begun when a pre-historic “firemaker” — probably somewhere in Asia — first mixed saltpeter with charcoal from a cooking fire to use as tinder.

Like many other inventions, pyrotechnics were first viewed as weapons of war. The Chinese launched or tossed rockets and explosive missiles in very early times.

Yet, even then, firepower played an important role in the Chinese civilian life, with elaborate and ingenious displays to mark celebrations.

Peripatetic Arabs and Greeks eventually spread the knowledge to Europe, where fireworks displays were enthusiastically embraced and soon outstripped their Asian forbears, according to Britannica.

When guns evolved in the 14th century, the military created the position of “fireworker,” whose day job was to provide pyrotechnic engines of war. His duties soon included nighttime displays of fireworks to celebrate victories or peace.

Unprecedented displays blazed in the early 18th century skies over Versailles Palace near Paris, in London and many Western European Capitals. And they just got bigger and more elaborate as the century moved along, reaching across the Atlantic Ocean to the nascent United States — and eventually Laguna Beach.

OUR LAGUNA is a regular feature of the Laguna Beach Coastline Pilot. Contributions are welcomed. Write to Barbara Diamond, P.O. Box 248, Laguna Beach, 92652; hand-deliver to Suite 22 in the Lumberyard, 384 Forest Ave.; call (949) 494-4321 or fax (949) 494-8979.