John Williams, Treasures of Nhill & District Facebook page, Nhill Free Press & Kaniva Times

Now that Halloween has passed for another year, so too has the grumbling from some who see it as an American influenced import and a waste of time and money.

The same could be said for the imported English tradition of Guy Fawkes night which no doubt holds a special place in the memories of Baby Boomers.

Also known as Cracker Night or Bonfire Night, November the 5th was none bigger than in Nhill, particularly during the 50’s, 60’s and 70’s.

On the big night a pall of smoke would waft over the town, intermittently broken by the streak and glare of skyrockets as the air was split with the machinegun explosions of crackers.

The community boasted two major bonfires supported by smaller events dotted around vacant blocks in the town.

The Scouts staged their bonfire near Salisbury on the Dahlenburg property using branches and scrub cleared from a camp site.

In Nhill the Apex club put in a mighty effort for a giant centrepiece bonfire at the swamp fuelled by mallee roots and dozens of old tyres which attracted hundreds of adults and children keen to light up their haul of colourful crackers in rapid succession.

It was remarkably dangerous fun in different times and eventually banned because of mounting injuries and the fire danger.

As you can imagine the Apex fire in the swamp was still burning well into the following day and at the height of the fire the smoke was so dense the traffic on the western Highway, including transports was slowed to a crawl.

Fireworks usually went on sale a couple of weeks before the event and for some, this gave us time to get up to mischief.

While the writer tended to be irresponsible blowing up letter boxes and attaching fire starting sparklers to skyrockets, the very responsible and inventive John Whitehead cleverly used skyrockets to send soldier beetles into space or creating a pipe cannon to fire rocks over his Nelson Street back fence. He strenuously denies attempting to hit the beetle railcar.

He had an endless supply of gunpowder of course from Whitehead Stores.

Many other shops in town offered a range of crackers from penny bungers, tom thumbs, catherine wheels, flower pots, roman candles, throw-downs and skyrockets of various sizes which John Whitehead could fashion to multi-stage rockets with a creature carrying nosecone fashioned from sticky-tape. (Durex) 

The preparation for cracker night was just as much fun as the night itself if you were into bonfire building and it’s a craft I learned when living in Stawell for several years. Schoolmate Andrew Robson and myself would gather tree branches on the outskirts of town using a self-propelled rotary hoe to tow the timber to a block near the dairy.

We would stand on caravan dolly wheels attached to the rear of the hoe as we negotiated the dozens of goldmine shafts that dotted the landscape. I still marvel at how we escaped death by not disappearing down a very deep hole with our motorised contraption.

110 years ago the Nhill Free Press wrote: 

The anniversary of the “Gun powder plot’’ was celebrated on Thursday evening in Nhill by the younger section of the community.

Numerous youngsters spent an exceedingly busy time gathering bushes and other inflammable material for the construction of the bonfires which were to be ignited at dusk.

Besides the gleaming fires, particularly across the line in Edwards’ paddock, the children had innumerable crackers and brilliantly coloured fireworks with which to suitably recognise Guy Fawkes Day.

The fact that many of the children do not know anything about the “Gunpowder Plot,’’ the origin of the celebration did not in the least detract from their enjoyment.

The original reason for Cracker Night was to commemorate the capture and execution of Guy Fawkes, the Catholic conspirator who tried to blow up British parliament with gunpowder in 1605.

It was often joked that Fawkes is remembered as the only person who ever entered parliament with honest intentions.

For most kids, the plot’s failure and subsequent celebrations have just been an excuse to set stuff on fire and for parents’ bonfires were handy for getting rid of hard rubbish.

Cats and dogs went missing all over the place, and were sometimes never found having been targets for cruel pranks.

And sometimes, according to the Nhill Free Press, those unknown would set bonfires alight a day early which happened several times in Nhill much to the disappointment of kids who built them.

At the aftermath of the Apex fire one year there was a loud explosion, put down to a detonator being tossed into the coals, or was it half a stick of gelignite? 

New regulations were introduced by the State Government in 1963 limiting the size of fireworks sold in Victoria, although bonfire events still went ahead.

It wasn’t until 1974 that larger fireworks were banned, leaving much smaller novelty crackers on the shelves and they too were banned in 1982.

The final Guy Fawkes letterbox was blown up in Nhill some time in the 80s and the whole tradition of Cracker Night has since burned down to embers.

For most nostalgic Baby Boomers Halloween, could not hold a wick against the wild freedom of “bonnie night” which just fizzled out leaving us safer but with just a party popper for that whiff of gunpowder.

This article appeared in the Nhill Free Press & Kaniva Times, 20 November 2024.