It's been 29 years

[ambrose607]

Hi Raiders, Just watching the news and it's been 29 years since the last legal cracker night. Come on all you oldies what are your memories.

[Scratchie]

How good was the olds day of ball shooters, throw downs, parachutes and bonfires! Then the fun police brought in public liability!

Now we have to assemble like a herd of sheep on the foreshore with 1.4 million other people just to see some crackers!

Cheers scratchie!!!

[Blood Knot]

Good post Ambrose

How did we survive the pre cracker night festivities with the local kids - bunger wars and roman candle wars. Then there was cracker night at home under Dads supervision, launching sky rockets out of 26 oz beer bottles that would invariably fall over mid launch sending us scattering in all directions - and watching the cathrine wheels falling of the nail in the paling fence and chasing mum around the yard - ah those were the days. Neighbourhood bonfires and the next best thing to cracker night, which was going out the morning after and collecting all the fireworks that did not go off. Was always challenging dealing with those short wicks.

Cheers Blood Knot

[ambrose607]

Hey Blood Knot you brought back some really good memories. Remember that cranky old bugger who lived in the street. He had to buy a new letter box every year

[Yowie]

My mate lived across the road from me. He fired penny rockets across the road (with double happies tied down the stick) so that by the time the rocket flew across the road, the sparks would light the double happy wick and blow up around my head. So he copped quite a few of those in return.

We also threw penny bungers across the road at each other.

My mate bought a packet of penny bungers (might have been 40 to the pack) removed the gun powder from them and placed the gun powder into a tree stump in his back yard. Added a wick and some putty, lit it and the bloody thing sent tree bits and pieces into the neighbours yards and onto the back of his house, His father cracked the shits for days due to the damage to the house.

[Guest]

We used to have thunder fights and they were the biggest bungers and we would tie them together and chuck them over the grass hills at each other like grenades

[Ryder]

Hey Blood Knot you brought back some really good memories. Remember that cranky old bugger who lived in the street. He had to buy a new letter box every year

We were lucky to have it. Despite serious burns, the occasional detached digit, and worst of all dogs running away....not good.

It was awesome!!!. And it wasn't just one night. Once crackers were on sale Sydney had those bushfire sunsets.

I remember one letterbox in particular, Across the road from my mates place.

Solid plastic construction with a rooster weathervane. It survived all kinds of homemade bungas.

It couldn't withstand a big volcano. Lit it and ran off giggling, green flames shooting 6ft out of the mail slot.

My friends letterbox disappeared the next day.

[ambrose607]

Some kids would take throw downs to school. During weekly assembly the Head Master would be waffling on and some wags at the back would lob them at him. BANG BANG BANG. The poor bloke used to S#/T himself. He never saw the funny side of it.

[mrsswordfisherman]

Ah the memories. For weeks before we used to build bonfires. I grew up in Coogee and there were two parks that had huge ones. We threw everything on the bloody things and they were massive. We had gang wars and kept the bonfires heavily guarded!

The boys at school used to throw the throw downs at you when you were walking along the street or the school yard.

We used to spend months collecting a selection of Roman Candles, Flower Pots, Volcanos, Catherine wheels, skyrockets with parachutes, pin wheels, pohas, sparklers, screech rockets. I remember once my friend had his collection inside a school case and he dropped a match into the case and boommmmm.

Then there were the bungers, Tom thumbs, thunders, halfpenny bungers, penny bungers, etc

We used to open all the bungers and get a huge pile of gun powder and tie all the wicks together to make a very long wick. We would get a buzz out of lighting the wick and watching it burn to the pile of gun powder. The silly boys would hold bungers in their hands and chuck them just before they exploded!

The night was so exciting. Mum used to make special soup and bread rolls (it was always freezing cold). Letting all the crackers off took hours. Kids would have friendly fights about what cracker would be next. I remember Dad getting angry when we set the shrubbery along the front fence on fire and the time we set off a wheel not nailed properly onto the fence. The thing took off and hit the neighbour in the head and burnt her big beehive hairdo.

Ah yes the memories

mrsswordfisherman

[ambrose607]

Yeah all great memories Donna. We would have a dozen old car tyres from the local garage. If the EPA was around at that time and saw all the black smoke coming off the bonfires all hell would've broke loose.

[mrsswordfisherman]

Yeah all great memories Donna. We would have a dozen old car tyres from the local garage. If the EPA was around at that time and saw all the black smoke coming off the bonfires all hell would've broke loose.

Of course the tyres hahahah you had to climb up them to get to the top of the bonfire!!!

In all seriousness if they brought it back now there would be so many injuries and deaths from stupidity

[bessell1955]

All very fond memories are brought back by these posts, but how many serious injuries and permanent disfigurements have been avoided by the banning of fireworks?

[GreyNurse]

What about the twopenny bungers (pronounced tuppeny bungers). They were the ducks guts for firepower. I have fond memories of meeting my mates at the local park the next morning for the UXB hunt. If the night before was really dewy, we'd clean up and spend all Sunday morning doing all again, in ways that crackers weren't meant to be used. And remember the instructions? That was my first introduction to pictionary. Was soooo funny! Yep, fond memories all right. And that's probably the way it should stay. Today's kids would never survive.

[Fab1]

What about the twopenny bungers (pronounced tuppeny bungers). They were the ducks guts for firepower. I have fond memories of meeting my mates at the local park the next morning for the UXB hunt. If the night before was really dewy, we'd clean up and spend all Sunday morning doing all again, in ways that crackers weren't meant to be used. And remember the instructions? That was my first introduction to pictionary. Was soooo funny! Yep, fond memories all right. And that's probably the way it should stay. Today's kids would never survive.

Todays kids would never survive because it means that they have to go outside and socialise with REAL people.It would be a alien world to them.

[snatcher]

Us pomms celebrate our Bonfire Night on 05 November every year To those of you who do not know about the "Gunpowder Plot" of 1605 here is a link to it.http://www.bonfirenight.net/gunpowder.php

Back in the 1950/60s every street used to have its own bonfire. Nowadays the tendancy is to have organised displays. Recall firing rockets up the back lane at rival bonfires !!!!! I also blew up a wasps nest with a bundle of fireworks once and yes I got badly stung

I do enjoy firework photography now though. Here is one from our local display in Whitley Bay.

John

[ambrose607]

This sums it up - John Williamson

[harold]

Gee this thread brought back memories. I recall throwing a Tom Thumb at my mother and she was holding a box filled with my brothers fireworks. Unfortunately the bunger went in the box and the next thing I recall was my mother in technicolor. I nearly died twice that night, the first time was from laughing and the second time was from my father trying to catch me to give me a belting. That was 1962 and I was 12 at the time.

[jimg1au]

cracker night what a blast we allways spent it at my brothers property at the end of town big fire in dry dam all the bungers and fire works you could want plus the 12g at mignight

i still have small bonfires now have approval from rfs should be 1mx1mx1m mine is a fire pit i made myself 2mx2m sq so the flames go way over the 1m allowance having one this weekend if weather permits.just a fire and when the extended family kids come over sparklers have a few packets of them they love it

worst fire work stubben wick a bugger to light as per the name

[Guest Guest123456789]

NOTHING could beat the 'cartwheel'. My brother put one down the back of my pants - small burns to the butt cheeks, I got him back with a bunger stack under his bed when he was asleep. Mum was pissed!

[batfishing]

It went a bit longer in Melbourne, in 1977, Iwas an apprentice mechanic in the army. Between 4 platoon and 5 platoon we had an opened grass area....now remember we were apprentices, 15-17 years old. We had a full scale war between the 2 platoons with skyrockets and Roman candles and bungers, 2 resupply trips into the local town by a couple of the seniors that had cars....lasted nearly 2 hours until we landed one of the big skyrockets into the duty room.
We were still picking up spent fireworks 12 months later


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Edited August 2, 2015 by swordfisherman

[JohnDory]

Any one who can call it cracker night KNOWS.

JD

[shak4g63]

So many memmories. . I remember roman candles jumping jacks and these little round fly that would spin up off the ground. The smell of spent fire crackers.

Used to love those days...

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[Nolongeramember]

Oh yeah the smell!

I still go outside every now and then and pick up a smell in the air very similar to the "used fire crackers" and the memories come back.

I

[big Neil]

Ah the memories. Nov 5th...Guy Fawkes night in the UK. Celebrated because this chap (Guy Fawkes) tried to blow up the Houses of Parliament. Word is that he was the last person to enter the Houses of Parliament, with honest intentions. WE never had any serious injuries when burning the bonfire or setting off the fireworks...however todays kids would have megga problems. It would be near impossible to set off fireworks safely, with a mobile phone permanently attached to one's hand. On a lighter note we used to cook chestnuts and potatoes in the embers. They were delicious.

[Guest no one]

Guy Fawkes - the last person to enter parliament with honest intentions.

A well know saying and probably the most accurate!