As a child, November 5th was a very special, very important day and evening. There was a tradition of commemorating Guy Fawkes and his Gunpowder Plot to blow up the English Parliament way back in 1605 by having a Bonfire Night, also known as Cracker Night. An effigy of Guy Fawkes, known as The Guy, was burned on top of the bonfire.
I have penned a recollection of the Cracker Nights of my childhood and youth in a memoir of growing up – Small Town Kid. It was a wonderful occasion, and there is nothing like it available for young folk to experience anymore.
This link will take you to the poem – Crackers.
Happy Guy Fawkes day and night to you all.
Frank Prem Poetry 
Ah yes! My English father would have fireworks on Halloween and there was always the burning school house. When I lived in England there would be kids with the effigy that would go through the streets asking “Penny for the Guy?”
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It was such a very big deal every year, right up until around 1970 or thereabouts.
No more.
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A great nostalgic poem, Frank, it brings back such memories of cracker night. Of course it’s dangerous, and we did those things that kids do. I suppose those wonderful memories are not worth the cost overall … but we’re lucky to have them.
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Yes, Steve. Exactly right. My amazement isn’t really that it stopped being acceptable, but how quickly the changes came. I suppose it is always that way.
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Guy Fawkes night died out in Victoria because it became illegal to buy fire crackers. It probably wasn’t a really bad thing. I remember as a kid being able to just go down the shops and buy something that had the potential to blow your face off.
Once the law changed you could only blow your face off with a cracker if you knew someone who did trips to the ACT where they could buy them legally. Last time we did it was in Sydney 2001, well into adulthood but still very good proof as to why the crackers needed to be illegal đŸ™‚
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Yes, all very good reasons, but still a loss. Ah well.
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