Firework Diehards Enjoy One Last Halloween Before the Ban

The week before Halloween, M&M’s Fireworks Factory moved into what was once a tailor and dry cleaner on Dunbar Street in Vancouver to sell some last fireworks before a citywide prohibition took effect on Sunday.

The shelves, cleared of fabric and thread, stocked the likes of Crackle Jacks, Cherry Blasters and Screaming Banshees.

Dunbar, a quiet area today, may seem a surprising place to sell fireworks. But it was here 50 years ago that 300 youths wielded eggs and firecrackers in a battle with police and their dogs.

More on that later.

You might expect something semi-taboo like fireworks to be sold at a grungy place, but M&M’s feels like an Apple store. There’s a Genius Bar to help customers obtain their fireworks permits.

The employees, suave dudes in masks and streetwear, give customers one-on-one service, tablets and smartphones in hand to show videos of how everything works.

“I’ve always wanted to play with some,” said Johnathan Xu, 16. For his first fireworks experience, he picked out some sparklers and a Diwali fountain.

His mother, Camellia Yang, kept a close watch and asked a lot of questions. But overall, she was chill.

“Every year, we were thinking next year, next year, next year — now this year is the last year,” said Yang, who played with them herself in China, where most fireworks sold in Canada are made.

Like Vancouver, some cities in China have banned fireworks with the environment in mind, she noted. “I say, just let the kids have some good memories.”

At the mention of the ban, store employee Morteza Jasari shakes his head.

“What about alcohol and drugs? They’re more damaging,” said Jasari, who grew up in East Vancouver.

No fireworks for him and his friends would be like Halloween without candy. “Halloween for us is bigger than New Year’s. Halloween without fireworks is nothing.”

This Halloween was Vancouver residents’ last chance to buy and set off consumer fireworks after city council voted to ban them, putting an end to a city heritage.

One of the earliest historical mentions of fireworks in this part of B.C. is the story of how “Gassy Jack” John Deighton — the bar owner who gave Vancouver’s Gastown its name — went broke in 1867.

Deighton left an American shipmate in charge of his Globe Saloon in New Westminster, who then emptied the till for an explosive Fourth of July celebration.

Since then, many in the region have enjoyed commemorating various holidays with a bang, often in cozier neighbourhood celebrations compared to the massive corporate-sponsored fireworks every summer at English Bay.

For Mony Sodhi’s family, Diwali, which falls around Halloween, is one of those holidays. The Indian festival of lights is a big celebration in Metro Vancouver, with many Sikh gurdwaras hosting events in their parking lots with fireworks.

Sodhi is one of the Ms of M&M’s. The other is his cousin Mike Bhayana.

Growing up in East Vancouver, their families would get together at a backyard, Collingwood Park or the grounds of Carleton Elementary to set off dazzling displays.

“We’d save money, or beg dad,” said Sodhi. “And when my Asian friends wanted to do it for Chinese New Year, I’d join them, and my Persian friends for Persian New Year.”

Fifteen years ago, the firework-loving cousins decided to give the business a try. Sodhi was 25 at the time. The first M&M’s made its debut on Fraser Street, and business blossomed.

One year, the cousins had 19 stores open during the brief week that the city allowed fireworks to be sold. This year, there were only two, due to tighter restrictions.

“It’s a lucrative business for that one week, but it’s a pretty crazy grind and hustle,” said Sodhi.

Sodhi was the only person at M&M’s not in hip street fashion, instead donning a collared shirt and a Bluetooth earpiece. Every year he juggles his jobs as an accountant and immigration consultant with the Halloween hustle.

Lighting a firework might be simple, but the city had made the business anything but.

Before the ban, retailers needed a permit and plan for the store that followed city regulations, including fire extinguishers and cages for products to prevent customers from helping themselves.

And there’s the challenge of finding real estate. Landlords prefer long-term tenants, not ones that are gone in a flash. But if landlords have vacant space available early October, they will accept a fireworks retailer, provided they’re properly insured.

After employee safety training, there’s product knowledge to learn. Selling fireworks is different from other seasonal goods, said Sodhi.

“A Christmas tree is just a Christmas tree at the end of the day,” he said. “Here, you have to know 200 products.”

The M&M cousins have tried them all. Everything on the shelves was a favourite, their version of Heather’s Picks at Indigo bookstores.

“The fireworks stores that I used to go to when I was younger, excuse my language, were more thuggish,” said Sodhi. “They were cut and dry. You buy your product, you get out. There’s no friendliness. There’s no explaining the products. There’s no decorations.”

The cousins wanted stores that were family friendly. That’s why there are cute inflatable spiders and black cats, rather than snarling demons. After they started decorating their stores, other retailers followed suit, Sodhi recalls.

Over the years, it’s become the norm in Vancouver to see shops pop up with arresting signs advertising “FIREWORKS! FIREWORKS! FIREWORKS!”

Consumer fireworks are banned in many parts of Canada. Even in jurisdictions where they are allowed, Halloween is not typically a holiday where they’re permitted.

In Toronto, fireworks are attached to Canada Day and Victoria Day. At M&M’s, you’d find maple-leaf adorned fireworks capitalizing on that patriotism with names like Super Sorry and Great White North.

Vancouver’s Halloween fireworks tradition was likely set off by early English, Scottish and Irish settlers celebrating Samhain, a Gaelic festival known as Mischief Night.

Fireworks supply chains already existed for other holidays, such as Independence Day, the Lunar New Year and possibly even Guy Fawkes Day.

Throw in the city’s mild fall weather and you have the perfect meteorological and cultural climate to commemorate the spooky holiday.

But before fireworks lovers start chanting “Make Halloween Great Again,” remember the holiday’s contentious history in the city, says researcher Christine Hagemoen, who delved into Vancouver Halloweens past for a Scout Magazine article.

One year even resulted in a death: the electrocution of a young boy by a streetlamp that was knocked over by teens on a wet Halloween in 1919.

The city’s west side might be known as quiet today, but in the '60s it was the setting of much hooliganism. Aside from consumer fireworks, groups of violent boys and youth wielded Molotov cocktails and gasoline to set streets on fire.

On Halloween 1962, a Kerrisdale faceoff between youth and police resulted in an elderly woman being pushed into a store window, an elderly man having a heart attack, and a young man being bitten on the stomach by a police dog named Sabre.

“Kerrisdale isn’t really a place you’d think that tough kids would hang out,” said Hagemoen, “but on the west side, they let their children run more free-range. There were really scary gangs of children and teens just roaming around en masse.”

One ugly, epic battle in 1963 began with 300 screaming youths hurling eggs at police on Dunbar Street, reported the Vancouver Sun.

Firecrackers were thrown into a grocery store. Police used dogs and arrested people, with the youth swearing and banging their fists on cop cars as their handcuffed friends were driven away.

Vancouverites from across the city drove over to watch the west side showdown, which lasted almost three hours. Around midnight, police hurried down to Chinatown, where other ruffians were throwing oysters and firecrackers.

A number of rioters suffered burns during the ‘60s skirmishes. This was the decade that the city banned firecrackers. Hagemoen reminds that the clothing during this era was more flammable, with “old costumes made out of cheap fabric that would easily melt.”

Of course, Hagemoen recognizes that the history of youth safely enjoying fireworks over the years isn’t something that journalists are likely to report on.

In 2019, when Vancouver city council considered the ban, it wasn’t a particularly controversial issue, passing with a vote of 7 to 3. Critics at the time questioned whether it fed into the city’s stereotype as “No-Fun City.”

“Every time I think about fireworks, I think of fun,” said Mayor Kennedy Stewart, who voted to keep fireworks.

But Green Coun. Pete Fry, who brought forward the motion, said that fireworks are “no fun” for people with PTSD, some children, veterans, refugees and owners of pets that are “absolutely spooked and traumatized” by the annual displays.

Fireworks cause about $400,000 in damages a year, according to the city. Some related incidents in recent years include a dog that was frightened onto SkyTrain tracks and killed, and a house that was burnt down, almost killing a man.

This past pandemic Halloween was a busy night for police and fire services, a perfect storm of a Saturday, good weather and the last chance to set off fireworks before prohibition.

There were a few stabbings, and hundreds partied on downtown’s Granville Street strip, defying health recommendations to keep gatherings small, with some individuals drunk and hostile to officials.

There were no buildings set on fire this year, but a purple Porsche Panamera was set ablaze, and two days before Halloween a firework shot through an apartment window and burned an 88-year-old woman on the head.

Ultimately, regulating fireworks — everything from inspecting retailers to checking if people setting them off have a permit — is too much of a burden, says Capt. Jonathan Gormick of the city’s fire rescue services.

“The public appetite for something people want will find a way about prohibition,” said Gormick. But the ban “removes the onus on us permitting something we know will cause damage.”

Fireworks producers have found ways to skirt regulations by renaming products. For example, for jurisdictions that prohibit bottle rockets, they’ve created a product called Not Bottle Rockets.

For Mony Sodhi and his cousin, they aren’t sure what will become of the M&M empire they’ve built.

“You’re taking away heritage,” said Sodhi. “We are No-Fun City at the end of the day. Fireworks are safe if you do them securely, you do them privately, you follow protocols. I understand putting restrictions on time, because you have to respect neighbours who have to get up [for] work in the morning. But putting them away entirely?”

On Halloween this year, in a Collingwood park on the east side, Ajay Puri noticed that families were ignoring the regulation that fireworks were not allowed in public spaces.

He was touched by the scene, especially by a son taking instructions on which to set off from his mother in a wheelchair.

“It’s not all hoodlums doing fireworks!” said Puri. “We should get to know our neighbourhoods and be more curious. We should know other people’s stories.”

Puri grew up in Winnipeg until his teens. Like many who moved to Vancouver, he was surprised to discover that fireworks for Halloween and Diwali, which his family celebrated, were a favourite pastime in his new home.

“Fireworks? For what reason?” he remembers asking his friends.

It was the backyard celebrations that were the most memorable, with families sharing the enjoyment of monster packs they’d pick up for over $100.

“The aunties and girls would be way back. The boys would be more risk-taking and join the uncles to do the lighting. There would always be one or two pyromasters, who were also safety stewards. The elders would say, ‘Stay back! Relax and watch!’ Then we’d take out the monster pack and vote on which one to do next. It was a beautiful thing.”

Puri became a father this year, and he’s sad his son will miss out on fireworks.

He’ll have to pass on the stories of how his neighbourhood used to gather, sometimes in the late October fog, to light up the skies of the east side.

“Like a campfire,” he says.