Dynamite

I decided to unite the dynamite stories under one heading.  I will be necessarily vague in some parts as I’m not sure that the statute of limitations has run out on a few of these.  They all have explosive consequences and involve a common product, namely dynamite.  For those not familiar with dynamite, except for its occasional use in cowboy westerns and war movies, a little background is in order.

Dynamite is basically nitroglycerin in a stick.  Invented by Alfred Nobel of Peace Prize fame, it can be detonated with a blasting cap inserted within the stick.  The blasting cap can have a hollow end for a burning fuse or it can be the electrical type which requires that a voltage be applied to its contacts.  Dynamite is dangerous and unstable and should only be handled by a licensed professional.  It should never be handled by irresponsible idiots like in this story.

Flashback to the 1960’s, particularly 1967 Iowa.  As a newly arrived visitor I was casually asked if I would go into the hardware store and pick up three of sticks of dynamite, a couple  of blasting caps and a few feet of fuse.  Now, where I come from, firecrackers are illegal let alone dynamite.  I found out later that firecrackers were illegal in Iowa too.  But dynamite, no problem.  Any kid with a dollar in his pocket could buy all of the aforementioned explosive supplies.  I figured that I was about to be the butt of a joke but played along anyway.  I entered the hardware store.   I asked the clerk for the supplies and he told me to wait.  No one was more surprised than I when the clerk returned with the dynamite, blasting caps and fuse.

It seems that, in this farming community we will call Perry, dynamite was regularly used to remove large rocks.  These rocks seemed to rise up out of the ground in a previously plowed field.  At Big Jon’s farm we used the dynamite to remove one such bolder.  We drove the tractor out to our intended victim and dug a hole under one side of the rock.  We first used one stick of dynamite.  A pocketknife was used to hollow out a tunnel in the single stick.  We cut off a couple feet of fuse and stuffed one end into the open end of the blasting cap.  We then inserted the cap into the dynamite and shoved the entire thing down the hole.  We filled in the hole and lit the fuse.

I then saw Big Jon run for cover behind the tractor.  I didn’t know much about dynamite but that seemed like a good idea.  A loud muffled boom and the rock lifted out of the ground and then settled back into its home.

We repeated the process, this time using two sticks.  A few minutes later and pebbles were falling in Des Moines.  The large rock was no more.

I stayed in this town we will call Perry until just before Christmas when an incident hastened my departure.  It seems that someone dropped a quarter of a stick of dynamite into the stairwell leading down into the town’s police station.  This group of uncivilized youths had parked in the alleyway behind the station.  All was quiet on Main Street (Willis Ave?).  There was no traffic.  A patrol car was parked across the street and the lone officer appeared to be asleep.

One member of this nefarious group hurriedly walked to the railing above the open stairwell and dropped in the quarter stick of dynamite.  On his run back to the waiting car Denny, we will call him Denny, slipped on the ice and slid across the alleyway into a cluster of galvanized trashcans.  The sound was deafening.  It did not however arouse the sleeping patrolman across the street.  The tires slid and then gained traction.  We sped down the alley for several blocks and exited back on Main Street.  We turned in the direction of the police station and began the slow drive west.  A loud boom was heard and the sleeping patrolman jolted awake.  He knew something had happened but didn’t have a clue.  He flipped on his lights and sped down the main drag.

I recall this incident as it may have occurred if I had been one of the passengers in that two door black 1965 Pontiac Bonneville convertible with the 421 engine and three two-barrel carburetors.  I firmly deny all knowledge of the incident and have told this story as it could have happened….had I been there.

1965 Pontiac Bonneville

The explosion made the local paper.  In a small town I figured it wouldn’t take long to realize that the guy from Miami that had been buying all of the dynamite could be involved.  Even this police force could figure that one out.  I now had about ten sticks of dynamite, about a dozen blasting caps and maybe fifteen feet of fuse.  It was time to head home.

Neither extreme cold nor extreme heat is a good storage condition for dynamite.  The trip home was through snow.  Summers in Miami would also not be good.  I needed to use up the dynamite.

Marty and I took it out into remote areas west of town and blew up stuff.  We even took dates out there and pitched dynamite into a canal tied to a rock.  The road would lift, the water would shoot up and the girls would look terrified.  To this day I can’t say that I understand women any better than I did then.

If you read the story titled The Christmas Hunter you already know the main characters of this next sequence of events.  The Hunter was also the recipient of this poorly planned prank.  If it were a separate story it could be titled The New Year’s Eve Hunter or The Dynamite Hunter.

Marty and I didn’t have plans for New Years and the old adage about idle minds and the devil’s workshop may have relevance here.  We had alcohol.  We had a car, an old Oldsmobile and we had dynamite.  What more do you need to celebrate the ringing in of 1968.  The Hunter was stuck at home that night as his parents were having a big New Year’s Party.  We decided to make it one they would all remember.

We cut off a quarter of a stick and fitted it with a cap and an extra-long length of fuse.  A quarter of a stick was the tried and true recipe that had passed muster at a police station in Iowa, if I had been there of course.  I had Marty drive my car and I readied the dynamite.  It took several passes as cars passing by and difficulties lighting the fuse stymied our efforts.

Finally everything clicked.  The fuse was lit and I pitched it over the roof of the car and into the front yard.  It landed far from any parked cars and away from the house.  A royally stupid act committed by two [insert your own adjectives here] individuals.

We drove far away as fast as we could.  We expected to hear the boom.  The windows were down but we heard nothing.  It could be that we were about ten miles away when it exploded.  Nonetheless we had no confirmation that we had been successful.  We were worried that it didn't explode and that someone would find it.  Someone could get hurt.  Yes, I get the irony here, now I worry about somebody getting hurt after I threw dynamite into someone's front yard in a residential neighborhood.  Being a college graduate doesn't make you smart.

We decided to prove the cliché and we returned to the scene of the crime.  We turned the corner about two blocks down from The Hunter’s abode and received immediate confirmation.   This confirmation came in the form of the large pumper fire truck, four or five patrol cars and the many individuals walking the street with flashlights.  There was a heavy blue smoke still hanging in the air.  The smoke made almost solid beams of the flashlights and headlights.  We drove slowly by and couldn’t believe the results of our handiwork.  The neighbors were either in pajamas or in party attire and appeared confused.  There was no center to their interest.  They were looking up into trees, pointing to other houses along the block and didn’t seem to have any inkling as to what had happened.  We quickly drove home.

Curiosity killed the cat but we weren’t cats.  The next morning we couldn’t contain our interest  and so we called The Hunter.  He invited us over.  The conversation dwelled on how much alcohol The Hunter consumed at his parents’ party but the reason for our interest wasn’t mentioned.  We tried to steer the conversation in our intended direction but to no avail.  The Hunter was still fuzzy from the previous evening’s liquid refreshment.  Just then someone in the neighborhood lit a couple of firecrackers and we immediately commented.

Then it all came back to him.  “Hell, you should have been here last night”.  “Those firecrackers are nothing.”  “Someone tried to blow up my neighbor’s house.”  It would seem that nobody could explain the loud explosion so the neighborhood rumor mill cranked up.  A neighbor across the street was the target of most of the gossip as she had something to do with the Playboy Club in Miami.  So mobsters were surely responsible for the explosion.

It didn’t occur to The Hunter or anyone else to just look at his front yard.  There, not fifteen feet from the walkway, was a large burned circle in the grass.  The epicenter of the dynamite explosion.

I think we told The Hunter years later but I’m not sure.  We eventually lost touch with him.  Early in 1986 I went into the Navy to get around being drafted into the Army.  The remaining dynamite was left in the loft of my parent’s house to sweat out the nitro in the ninety-degree heat.  Luckily my father found the now wet cardboard box and elicited the help of the Biscayne Park Police Department to get rid of it.  He mentioned it in one of his letters to me.