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Nagaoka Festival
Memorial Service Or Not?
Date:24, Feb, 2023
Investigated and Written by Misaka Youhei
About our introductory articles


Hello. I'm here to talk about Nagaoka Festival that holds in Nagaoka city on the 1st to 3rd of August almost every year. They say it didn't go in 2020 and 2021 for the Covid-19 pandemic. In 2022, it went on safely as usual. The fireworks are very popular, many people visit there for watching those beautiful flowers bloom in the night sky.



Nagaoka Festival's Fireworks
File: Wikimedia Commons
(Photoed on August 3, 2017)

They say the festival was firstly there in 1946 summer. The city was, as known widely, attacked by the American air-raid on 1st of 1945 August (the closing stage of World War 2). 125 bombers (Boeing B-29) flied all over Nagaoka and dropped about 160,000 incendiary bombs. They burnt close to 12,000 houses and buildings, killed next to 1,500 people there. We must say it was nothing but a genocide. And after war, they held a festival with their prayer for recovery in 1946. It was the beginning of the Nagaoka Festival. Then does it mean a kind of memorial services? you must ask. The answer is no. It is said fireworks display first appeared there in 1906. It is the time when people almost lived in peace without any World War. To sum up, Nagaoka Festival surely includes a memorial service but the fireworks display basically have nothing to do with war damage. Day 1 (August 1) means their memorial service, they hardly show fireworks. Day 2 and 3 are there for the fireworks display. At the Shinano River in night, many visitors watch the beautiful fire flowers briefly bloom in the sky.



Nagaoka City After The Air-raid
File: Wikimedia Commons
(Photoed in 1945)



Nagaoka Festival's Fireworks
File: Wikimedia Commons
(Photoed on August 2, 2018)


Nagaoka Festival Official Site (Japanese)





 

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