Seniors
stamp out bonfire
A Break with tradition. Class
opts for fireworks.
Tuesday, November 15, 2005 • By SARAH CASSI •
The Express-Times
PHILLIPSBURG | The flame has been
extinguished on the Stateliners' annual bonfire.
At the school board's meeting Monday
night, Phillipsburg High Principal Mary Jane Deutsch said
the 2006 senior class voted unanimously to replace the
annual bonfire with a fireworks display.
The board approved a fireworks display
that will cost between $2,500 and $4,000 and will be paid
for with student fundraising accounts. The display will be
part of the Thanksgiving Day Pre-Game Community Pep Rally on
Nov. 23 in Maloney Stadium.
Bonfires have hallmarked pep rallies on
both sides of the Delaware River for the annual Thanksgiving
Day football game between the Easton Red Rovers and the
Phillipsburg Stateliners.
The Phillipsburg bonfire changed in 2003,
however, when the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs
began to enforce the state's open burning
regulations.
The regulations only allowed bonfires to
be 5 feet high by 5 feet wide, but Phillipsburg was granted
a waiver by the state for the last three years for bonfires
10 feet long, 5 feet high and 10 feet wide.
The traditional bonfires were 40-feet
high and 30-feet wide in years past.
This year's senior class vote was a
complete turnover from last year, when the 2005 senior class
voted overwhelmingly to keep the bonfire.
"We've all been disappointed because of
the fire codes and sizes of the bonfires," said school board
President Rod Pianelli. "Hopefully, we can pull this off and
it will be one more tradition in this tradition-laden
community."
Deutsch said the annual senior sleepover
on Nov. 22 will continue and the fireworks slated for the
following day's events could draw as many as 4,000 people to
the community rally.
Reporter Sarah Cassi can be reached at 610-258-7171 or by
e-mail at scassi@express-times.com.
© 2005 The Express-Times. Used with
permission.
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