GUY FAWKE'S NIGHT

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27500, 6 November 1954, Page 2

GUY FAWKE'S NIGHT

BEACH BONFIRES AND FIREWORKS

BUSY DAY FOR. BRIGADE Hundreds of children and adults observed the Guy Fawkes night tradition With brushwood bonfires and fireworks on the New Brighton beach last evening. A dozen fires dotted the foreshore from New Brighton to beyond North Beach, but the biggest blaze was prepared by children in front of the New Brighton Surf Club’s pavilion. Here a big crowd gathered, many from the city where bonfires were prohibited. Rockets were fired out over the surf, crackers stuttered on the sand, and the children excitedly inhaled the pungent fumes from gunpowder and the blazing rubber tyres, with which they had augmented the bonfire. Shopkeepers did a roaring trade in confectionery till late in the. evening, and even at 10.30 p.m., when it was still calm and warm, some parties lingered' on the beach with an abundant supply of fireworks. At other points small boys scrambled about the sandhills to replenish stocks of brushwood fuel for their bonfires. Other groups stood silhouetted by the shower of sparks from Roman candles or watched the glow of the fires fade in the surf. , , Christchurch streets resounded at times during the evening with fusillades of crackers, and although bonfires were forbidden, the evening sky was bombarded with rockets. The Christchurch Fire Brigade was kept busy attending to fires. The first call was received early in the afternoon when at 12.42 p.m. the brigade were called to a fire in a paling fence at 59 Kirkwood avenue. Children had been playing with matches. At 2.58 p.m. they were called to a hedge fire at 206 wainoni road. A chesterfield in a house at 25 Harvey terrace, Richmond, caught fire at 6.44 p.m. At 8.26 p.m. the brigade put out a grass fire at 18 Moreland avenue, Papanui. Fireworks also started a grass fire at 23 Aotea terrace, St. Martins, about 8 p.m. This time adults were to blame. A unit from the ’New Brighton station attended a fire among lupins near Beatty street, South Brighton, at 10.30 p.m.