The History of Fireworks and Pyrotechnics
Origins of the Roman Candle, Sparkler, and Gunpowder
Jul 22, 2008
The creation and origins of gunpowder is really what lit off the fireworks story, and as the story goes, apparently a common cook accidentally mixed three common kitchen ingredients (KNO3 - Potassium-Nitrate, Sulfur, and Charcoal) thereby producing a volatile mixture that would soon come to be used in Chinese warfare.
Among other applications, were the creation of exploding bamboo sticks and a sort of rat missile, in which a live rat, propelled by explosives, would be aimed at enemies on horseback in one of the earliest and most bizarre examples of psychological warfare in history.
Marco Polo and Fireworks Beginnings
But before gunpowder could be transformed into fireworks, it had to be rescued from the Orient and brought to the modern world, which Marco Polo did some time during the 13th Century, although some accounts credit the knights of the Crusades with unleashing the "fire-chemical" (huo yao) from Far East.
Whatever the case, by 1560 Europeans scientists had further refined the volitility of the mixture by using the following ratios: 75% salt peter, 15% Charcoal, and 10% Sulphur. That was more of less the bang behind fireworks and still is today, but credit is given to the Italians and sometimes Germans for using aerial shells and various slow-burning compounds to create brilliant erupting fountains of color.
The whole of Europe was fascinated and quickly became transfixed on the idea of controlled fire, especially the wealthy, for whom grand fireworks displays became interwoven with societal standing. Such displays became so popular, in fact, that Queen Elizabeth created the position of "Fire Master of England." (She also, incidentally, had her own personal brewmaster.)
King James II was also so pleased with the fireworks display that during his coronation he knighted his Fire Master. Even Shakespeare notes that "certain stars shot madly from their spheres" in A Midsummer Night's Dream. So enamored with the concept of controlled fire was Europe at this time that yellows and oranges (from steel and charcoal) would be enough variety in color for another 200 plus years.
Modern Science and Chemistry of Firworks
A rainbow of colors would not be added to fireworks until around the 1830s, when Italian chemists started adding trace amounts of metals and salts that burned at high temperatures. These salts created beautiful and exciting new colors, and other additives produced interesting effects, like calcium to deepen colors, titanium to make sparks, and zinc to create mysterious smoke clouds.
Chemists also found that stontium created red fireworks, baium created green, copper made blue, sodium made yellow, and white/gold came from aluminium and magnesim. As the art of fireworks matured, the anatomy changed as well, with a standard make up (according to PBS Nova on-line) that consists of a launch tube (the main container with a charge of gunpowder in the bottom), main fuse, lift charge (main source of propulsion), stars (marble-size units containing metal salts and color-producing chemicals), breaks (cardboard sections each containing gunpowder), and spegettes (small time-release fuses loaded in the breaks used to ignite to stars).
Fireworks Fact and Stats
This new science and technology produced a brighter, more vibrant, more colorful and longer-lasting display of color and light. Speaking of light, it travel almost 170 times faster than sound (as any high school science book will tell you).
This is why fireworks seem to have a duel impact - first lighting up the sky (caused by burning chemical salts), then, moments later, a booming sound, which is caused by the rapidly expanding gas (produced by igniting the chemicals) bursting through the shell and displacing the air around it very quickly.
Sound travel at 768 mph, or about one mile in five seconds. According to Robert Krampf's Science Education Co. on-line, this movement of air creates reverberating waves, which the ear perceives as sound.
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