Decades after Fireworks Sparked Devastating Fires, Bans Lifted in Two Iowa Cities
Sioux City Journal, Iowa
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SPENCER, Iowa — Armondo Rosales looks forward to setting off fireworks in his home city of Spencer for the first time later this week.
Discharges of firecrackers, bottle rockets, Roman candles and other pyrotechnics will be legal in all Iowa cities and counties this Fourth of July holiday, thanks to a new state law.
"I've been buying them for years, we've just always had to go out to a farm and light them off," Rosales said as he stopped at the Wild Willy's Fireworks stand in Spencer last Saturday. "I like the law. It lets us fulfill our right to celebrate the country's birthday with fireworks."
In 2017, Iowa lawmakers erased a statewide ban on most commercial fireworks that had stood since 1938. The prohibition was prompted by fires sparked by fireworks that destroyed large swaths of the Northwest Iowa cities of Spencer and Remsen in the 1930s.
The 2017 law gave cities and counties the option of whether to allow fireworks discharges within their own borders. With memories of their historic still smoldering, local leaders Spencer and Remsen voted at the time to continue to disallow them.
But a new law signed by Gov. Kim Reynolds earlier this year effectively overturned all local bans, allowing Iowans to shoot off fireworks on July 3, July 4 and Dec. 31.
As a result, the city councils in Remsen and Spencer were required to adopt new ordinances that align with the new law, which took effect Tuesday.
"Our hands are pretty much tied. We have to go with what the state law is," Remsen Mayor Craig Bartolozzi said. "We’re still going to enforce if there is any negligence or recklessness of shooting them off."
In both Remsen and Spencer, the ordinances keep in place bans on fireworks other times of the year. Under Iowa law, cities and counties are permitted to allow fireworks June 1 through July 8 and Dec. 10 through Jan. 3. During these timeframes, pyrotechnics can only be set off between 9 a.m. and 10 p.m. each day. Discharges are allowed up to 11 p.m. on July 4 and the weekends before and after Independence Day.
Setting off commercial fireworks in a public park or other city property is also still banned without local approval.
State code also contains other fireworks regulations, including a ban on the sale of fireworks to people under age 18 and a prohibition on individuals and organizations setting off “display” fireworks, such as professional shows, without permission from their local governmental body.
Historic fires
Separated by just over 60 miles, Spencer and Remsen made history 90 years ago, and the destruction contributed to Iowa's longtime fireworks ban.
Spencer fire 1931
A June 27, 1931 fire started in the building above that housed the Otto A. Bjornstad Drug store in downtown Spencer, Iowa. This Fourth of July holiday, it will be legal to discharge fireworks in Spencer for the first time since the state banned most commercial fireworks in 1938.
On June 27, 1931, a fire destroyed four blocks of businesses in Spencer. The blaze caused more than $2 million worth of damage and leveled more than 80 businesses in just 25 minutes.
The fire started in the Bjornstad Drug Store on the corner of Fourth Street and Grand Avenue, where as legend has it, a boy was playing with a sparkler, which was mostly likely lit by one of the store's employees. Somehow, the sparkler fell into a fireworks display, causing an explosion heard in every corner of the city.
Firefighters from across Northwest Iowa responded to the blaze, according to contemporary reports. The firefighters' job was made more difficult by hot, windy conditions that day, as temperatures hit a high of 97 and winds gusted to up to 25 to 35 miles per hour.
The infamous inferno didn't immediately prompt a statewide fireworks ban. That happened five years later, following a devastating fire in Remsen on July 4, 1936.
Remsen Historic Fire
Businesses in downtown Remsen, Iowa, burned in a July 4, 1936, fire that was ignited by fireworks. The blaze led to an 84-year ban on most fireworks in Iowa. For the first time since then, it will be legal to set off fireworks in Remsen this Fourth of July holiday.
Like Spencer's, Remsen's blaze was believed to be caused by children who were playing with fireworks in a tent. Fed by gusting winds, the fire spread quickly spread to the Bellmeyer and Hodgen garage, and from there two blocks north to a lumberyard, grain elevators, a baseball field, a residential neighborhood, according to a Sioux City Journal report on the 80th anniversary of the blaze.
The inferno destroyed 15 homes and nearly 40 businesses and caused more than $500,000 worth of damage.
Two days later, the Remsen City Council banned fireworks. Two years after that, the Iowa Legislature enacted a statewide ban.
'Steady' retail sales
While setting off pyrotechnics is now legal in Remsen this Fourth of July holiday, no retailers applied for a state permit to sell commercial fireworks in the Plymouth County town of nearly 1,700, according to the Iowa Department of Inspections, Appeals, and Licensing.
In Spencer, population 11,451, there are eight licensed commercial fireworks retailers this season, including six temporary tents and two permanent stores, according to the department's website.
"We set up a tent (to sell out of) in Storm Lake in past years,'' owner Corrine Hoogeterp said. "This is our first year being set up in Spencer, so we're very excited to be able to set up and sell in our hometown, being from Spencer."
Since it opened in June, the stand has had "some good days and some slow days," she said.
"Today has been steady, but a very good day," Hoogeterp said last Saturday. "I think as it gets closer to Friday, it's going to pick up. We're expecting a last-minute rush as the holiday gets closer, too.
"And with the holiday being on a Friday leading into the weekend, we're going to be open for part of the day on Saturday (the 5th), because we think people are going to still want to be outside and have some entertainment to enjoy the weekend. So we're allowed to be open for part of the day on Saturday and we will be."
Rosales will be among the throngs of Spencer residents celebrating the nation's birthday with the colorful display of pyrotechnics.
"As long as there are certain parameters about where you can light them off in town, I'm glad (the law) was lifted," Rosales said.
Journal sports editor Ryan Timmerman and Lee-Gazette Des Moines Bureau reporter Erin Murphy contributed to this story.
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