{"id":67,"date":"2004-09-05T19:32:10","date_gmt":"2004-09-05T23:32:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/stepno\/2004\/09\/05\/beyond-the-esplanade\/"},"modified":"2007-03-30T10:25:35","modified_gmt":"2007-03-30T14:25:35","slug":"beyond-the-esplanade","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/stepno\/2004\/09\/05\/beyond-the-esplanade\/","title":{"rendered":"Beyond the Esplanade"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a name=\"a84\"><\/a>  One of the last best things I did in Cambridge was to go see the July 4 fireworks from the bank of the Charles with blogging friends (Thanks, <a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/jkbaumga\/\">J<\/a>!), getting closer to the flash and crash  than my previous years&#8217; vantage point in a crowd of neighbors atop <a href=\"http:\/\/radio.weblogs.com\/0106327\/2004\/01\/01.html#a113\">Prospect Hill<\/a>, a mile or so from the sound and smoke.<\/p>\n<p>This weekend I was watching more pyrotechnics from atop another hill, the one I live on now. I&#8217;m so new here that I don&#8217;t even know if the hill has a name, but it gave me a <a href=\"http:\/\/radio.weblogs.com\/0106327\/2004\/09\/05.html#a289\">new perspective<\/a> for a fireworks show that competes for excitement and audience with Boston&#8217;s Independence Day.<\/p>\n<p>Knoxville calls the Labor Day event <a href=\"http:\/\/www.knoxnews.com\/kns\/fun_stuff\/article\/0,1406,KNS_342_3153982,00.html\">Boomsday<\/a>. A sponsor also calls it &#8220;the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.star1021fm.com\/Boomsday\/\">biggest single-day event in the state<\/a> of Tennessee                and the largest fireworks show in the southeast United States.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Whille Boston fires its rockets from a barge in the river, these fireworks are launched from a high bridge over the Tennessee River &#8212; a bridge that just happens to be anchored to my new hilltop. Down along the river, the city closes a stretch of highway, turning it into a midway for the day, stretching off toward the university stadium. Hundreds of thousands of people join in the fun, and the &#8220;Tennessee navy&#8221; drops anchor in the river &#8212; about 200 powerboats that stay for Sunday&#8217;s Big Orange football game.<\/p>\n<p>The Boomsday show doesn&#8217;t include the Boston Pops, Stars &amp; Stripes Forever or the 1812 Overture cannons&#8230; but I read that there was some Gershwin broadcast to coincide with the most elegant part of the display, and at a more climactic point I did hear a few people singing along with Lee Greenwood&#8217;s &#8220;God Bless the USA.&#8221;  Next year, maybe I&#8217;ll find a seat closer to the sound system.<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/radio.weblogs.com\/0106327\/2004\/09\/05.html#a289\">Beyond the Esplanade &#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One of the last best things I did in Cambridge was to go see the July 4 fireworks from the bank of the Charles with blogging friends (Thanks, J!), getting closer to the flash and crash than my previous years&#8217; vantage point in a crowd of neighbors atop Prospect Hill, a mile or so from [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1089,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1397,1391,481],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-67","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-knoxville","category-stepnostories","category-tennessee"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/stepno\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/stepno\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/stepno\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/stepno\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1089"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/stepno\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=67"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/stepno\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/stepno\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=67"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/stepno\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=67"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/stepno\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=67"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}