[RKDinOKC]

Happy to grow up in USA, Happy Birthday!

Looking back glad I grew up when I did, and feel sorry for the kids today despite video games and the internets.

We were given a couple of bucks, could ride our bike or walk to a fireworks stand buy a grocery bag or more of firecrackers and pop botttle rockets, then go home and have wars with our friends and neighbors throwing and shooting them at each other. Blew up most of the model cars and planes we built the year before and anything else we found. Death to ant hills, especially red ants! Bottle rocket (no report) powered balsa wood 10¢ gliders were great until a bottle rocket with report.

I had separated out a string of 800 black cats and put them in a grocery sack to carry around and light and throw. A pop bottle rocket landed in the bag. I dropped it and ran as the whole bag started going off. It made a fireball about a foot in diameter, the dispersed lit firecrackers out about 20 ft in diameter. It was fantastic. Better than a death star explosion. Left a huge mess of paper. Instead of playing war with fireworks, we tried the rest of the day to replicate it!