Saturday, August 22, 2009

Happy Statehood Day!

Today is statehood day here in Hawaii. This year we're celebrating 50 years as a state - if you want to call it celebrating. Nothing seems to be going on here, no parades or speeches or anything, just all the schools and libraries closed for the day. That doesn't sound like much of a holiday to me. There was a funny article in the paper telling about the first statehood day. Some government official was going to give a speech, then fireworks were going to be set off. It being 1959 and easy communication not available, one guy was supposed to keep in touch with the fireworks guys, telling them when the speaker was done so they could set off the fireworks. But, they ran out of dimes for the pay phone and had to resort to hand signals. There was a misunderstanding and they set the fireworks off right as the speaker started. But, that's not the best part. The fireworks went every direction but up, there were people diving off the pier into the water and hiding behind rocks to escape them. Now THAT'S the way to celebrate!

1 comment:

Keisha said...

Sound like my mom one year when one of our fireworks went crazy and landed under her chair! OOPS!!!