Blowing It All At Once

Paul Souza clearly is not old enough to have seen the first set of professional fireworks his dad’s dad’s dad’s dad set up in the early 1900s.

Yet here he is, standing in the shadows of the Rose Bowl a warm yet breezy day, placing the final touches of an Independence Day aerial extravaganza and continuing a tradition started five generations ago.

Hailing from the Inland Empire, Souza, 33, is the latest fireworks prodigy in a long line of pyrotechnicians. It is almost a birthright to be in his position, what with about a century worth of experience in the aerial fire display business.

All he cares about, though, is bringing a smile to the faces of every person who witnesses his fireworks display. Luckily for the hundreds of thousands of adoring on-lookers on the Fourth of July at the Rose Bowl, Souza will be presenting the bright aerial display shortly after the sun’s radiance has left Los Angeles for the day.

“Once you see the smiles on faces, it is hard not to enjoy this,” Souza told Pasadena Now as he was preparing the fireworks along the northern edge of the Rose Bowl on Friday afternoon. “This is really an apprenticeship. My parents didn’t force this upon me. Just being heavily involved with the family business my whole life, naturally fireworks grew on me.”

It was an appreciation that took millennia to develop – 2,000 years, to be approximate.

“Firework technology has been in existence for about 2,000 years,” Souza added. “Because it has been around so long, the technology has been around for a long time. It is not something you can learn in a book, but you don’t have to be a mad scientist either. There is no need to learn on the fly.”

Just like Souza learned about the humble beginnings of his craft thousands of years ago, his family business, Pyro Specialists by Souza, also had modest roots. Tracing its history back to the early 1900s in the San Francisco Bay Area, Manuel de Sousa broke into the pyro business by creating fireworks for the Portuguese community and the culture’s Saint’s Days celebrations.

While its fireworks shows early on were a fraction of the size and cost of a typical display nowadays, Souza’s family business began to expand its operation when it moved to Southern California in 1979. Now, they have perfected their craft enough to be able to handle more than 5,000 objects blowing up in the sky to the delight of nearly 100,000 excited onlookers on one of America’s biggest holidays.

Of course, these words do no justice to Souza and his fire display. To fully grasp the quality of his work, be sure to trek down to the Rose Bowl later today and take in the 83rd Americafest Fourth of July celebrations. By attending, Souza is sure to bring a smile to your face before you leave the stadium for the evening.