- Tonight on WPBS Weekly, Inside the Stories Avoiding a Backyard tragedy.

Watertown Fire Chief Matt Timmerman offers some tips on how to safely light fireworks this season.

And just when you thought you knew everything about the upcoming holiday, we'll quiz you with things you may not have known.

Also, discover the wide array of performances taking place at the Kingston Grand Theater.

Your stories, your region coming up right now on WPBS Weekly.

Inside the Stories.

- WPBS Weekly inside the stories is brought to you by - When you're unable to see your primary care provider.

The Carthage Walk-in Clinic is here for you.

Located off Route 26 across from Carthage Middle School.

Comfort and Healing close to home when you need it most - North Country Orthopedic Group is there for your urgent ortho or sports related injuries.

With our onsite surgical center and same or next day appointments, we're ready to provide care for patients of all ages.

Your health matters to us North Country Orthopedic Group.

Keeping healthcare local.

- We are the north country where protecting one another like family is who we are and where our tomorrow will always be worth defending.

Find out how we keep the North Country Strong, at claxtonhepburn.org Today.

- Select musical performances are made possible with funds from the statewide Community Regrant program, a REGRANT program of the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the office of the Governor and the New York state legislator administered by the St. Lawrence County Arts Council.

- Good Tuesday evening everyone, and Happy Canada Day.

Welcome to this edition of WPBS Weekly.

Inside the Stories, I'm Michael Riecke.

Whether you're celebrating Canada Day or the 4th of July, why not start off tonight's program with some fireworks while creating a dazzling performance in the summer night sky, fireworks also come with their fair share of dangers.

We met with Watertown Fire Chief Matt Timmerman to learn how you can stay safe before shooting your fireworks into the sky.

- They're dazzling, they're colorful and incredibly dangerous if you don't know what you're doing.

As fire Chief Matt Timmerman explains fireworks come in many shapes and sizes with their own unique hazards.

- So fireworks, they kind of run the gamut between things that produce audible reports, so loud bangs, that sort of thing.

They often have showers of sparks.

Sometimes they have aerial devices that produce bangs and showers of sparks up in the up in the air.

Sometimes they're just sparklers that you can hold in your hand.

Wooden ones give a nice long hand of two.

The state has recently allowed the the small fireworks to be illegal.

So sparklers and, and the fountains.

Those have recently become legal, - But even these legal options still present real danger to the people lighting them dangers that Matt has seen.

- It's at a friend's house watching fireworks that other people were doing.

It was actually on the drive home, so I drove by.

I saw some fireworks going off and the tube that, that they were using that had fountains of sparks and was launching things into the air actually tipped over and started launching it across the yard.

So not a good situation there.

Fireworks by their nature are shooting off sparks all over the place.

We wanna make sure that you don't ignite anything around you.

So you don't wanna do this anywhere near any combustibles.

So keep it away from your house.

Keep it away from your garage.

Make sure any fuels are, are a safe distance away.

Make sure the people are a safe distance away and on flat level ground.

Light it, step back, let it do its thing.

- However, not all fireworks are ones you can step back from.

Sparklers, for example, can leave major injuries and burns if not handled properly.

- You get here are typical sparklers.

One odd thing is that we always give them to our young children, and that can be a little hazardous.

They're easy to run, but we give them to our young kids 'cause the kids love 'em.

That said, sometimes the kids get spooked by the fire, by the sparklers or they're running around.

They might trip, they might drop either hot ash or the hot sparkler stick on the ground and somebody else walks onto it or you know, their young kids.

They might just try to hand it over to somebody else with the hot side going towards you.

So ways that you can mitigate that is you can, you could take your children aside, show them how a sparkler works, have an adult run one first, talk to 'em a little bit about what to do and what not to do.

As this burns down with the wooden stick ones, you'll get some ash on the end and that ash will eventually drop off.

And that's something else that to be aware of.

It's not a good idea to be running around barefoot while you have sparkers.

An alternative might be, for example, glow sticks.

They make those in a lot of different shapes that kids enjoy.

They're pretty neat to swing around.

Might not have the same impact as fireworks.

Everybody likes good fireworks, but, but that would be something that's, that's reasonable safe.

You wouldn't have to worry about the kids getting a burn from a glow stick - When the fun is done and after ensuring the firework is finished.

It's also important to have a water source.

- Just drop the whole thing in and we're all set, - Or even a fire extinguisher handy to put out any further fires.

Lastly, a safety tip anyone should consider before playing with fire.

- One of the big problems I see is that when we wanna use fireworks, it's 4th of July or some other holiday, you're celebrating something important.

And what usually goes hand in hand with that is, is having a drink.

And you know, that's, frankly, they go hand in hand.

And that's kind of unfortunate.

We wanna make sure that everything's in moderation.

If you're inebriated, you probably shouldn't be the one who's igniting the fireworks.

I'm not saying that you shouldn't enjoy a drink, but if you are gonna enjoy a drink, let another adult do the lighting and you can sit back and, and watch the show.

You can really get into some serious trouble if, if everybody is intoxicated and there's not somebody who's making the sound decisions, running the fireworks.

Everything in the state of New York is typically I think what they refer to as a ground-based firework.

It's not an aerial firework fireworks that are illegal in the state of New York.

The aerial ones, they can be things like bottle rockets.

They can be mortars, which will shoot explosives up into the air.

They're great to look at.

They're best left to professionals.

- But if you're not a professional, - Fireworks are, are best operated by adults.

You know, obviously it's fine for a child to to have this sparkler, but it's probably not a good idea for a child to be lighting the sparklers.

It's probably not a good idea for a child to be lighting the, the fountains or anything larger.

So keep them back.

Let them enjoy the show - In Watertown, for WPBS Weekly, I'm Luke Smith.

- Just about everyone knows why we celebrate Canada Day and why Americans celebrate Independence Day, but there's more fun wrapped up in lesser known facts.

Get your pencils ready.

WPBS's Joleene DesRosier is about to test your knowledge on both of these holidays.

- Little known Independence Day facts.

Number one, not only were John Adams, our second president, and Thomas Jefferson, our third president, founding fathers who were instrumental in the independence movement and obviously important in the writing of the Declaration of Independence.

But they also both died on July 4th, 1826.

And that's not interesting enough for you though.

He die until 1831, James Monroe, our fifth president also perished on that same day.

July 4th, little known Independence Day Facts: number two, while we celebrate July 4th as Independence Day.

Actually the Continental Congress voted for independence on July 2nd.

The purpose of the Declaration of Independence was essentially to justify their decision.

Actually, John Adams told his wife, Abigail Adams, that he thought July 2nd would be the day that Americans of future generations would celebrate little known Independence Day.

Fact number three on July 4th, 1776, it's very likely only two people signed the historic document.

John Hancock, who most people know as the guy who had the giant signature, was the president of the second Continental Congress.

He signed the declaration that day.

He was joined by the secretary, Charles Thompson, who signed it also.

But that was basically confirming that it was Hancock's signature.

It was not until August 2nd that most, but not all of the delegates signed little known Independence Day.

Fact number four, Thomas Jefferson was actually an alternate delegate to the Continental Congress.

Though we know Jefferson is playing a significant role in the revolution.

He was not one of the seven delegates selected from Virginia.

Virginia, his home colony, was not lacking in prominent representatives.

Jefferson was not at the first Continental Congress either, and he was a late arrival as an alternate delegate at the second Continental Congress.

Of course, he did join the others and the rest is history.

- Little known Canada Day, fact number one, the name of Canada Day was only officially adopted in 1982.

After several failed attempts to change the name of the day from Dominion Day, the change finally passed through the House of Commons on a hot July afternoon when the members of the House who were present decided to push a private members bill through all three readings.

Little known Canada Day.

Fact number two, although Dominion Day was first proclaimed by Canada's Governor General in 1868, the year after Confederation, it didn't officially become a holiday until 1879 because members of parliament from Nova Scotia objected to the first bill that would've made it an official holiday feeling that their province had been forced into confederation against their will.

A decade later, those feelings had been smoothed over and the day officially became a holiday.

Little known Canada Day.

Fact number three, for decades, dominion Day was celebrated with picnics and fireworks displays across the country.

But it wasn't until 1958 that the federal government under Prime Minister John Diefenbaker, decided to organize major celebrations on Parliament Hill.

Starting a tradition in Ottawa that has lasted almost uninterrupted until the present day when one major exception was 1976, when the events were canceled as a budget cutting measure.

Little known Canada Day, fact number four, longtime Jeopardy game show host Alex Trebek co-hosted Canada's birthday celebrations on Parliament Hill in 1965, back when he was working for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

He was fluent in both English and French, which was important for the show, which aired on both the CBC and Radio Canada, the national public broadcaster's French counterpart.

- Did we test your knowledge?

We hope we have.

Take these facts to friends and family and see how much they know about each holiday.

For WPBS Weekly, I'm Joleene DesRosier.

- Up next, we head to downtown Kingston, where you'll find a historic yet dynamic home for the performing arts.

Since 1879, the Kingston Grand Theater on Princess Street has been a cultural cornerstone, bringing people together through unforgettable performances and events to learn more about their role in the region's art scene, we go to WPBS producer Guy Carlo.

- I would say the role of the arts is critical to a healthy community, to a vital community.

Kingston Grand is a pillar of the arts community here in Kingston, Ontario, and I would just stress that it's important to make that part of people's lives.

- Kingston Grand Theater is a community-based professionally managed institution located in the heart of downtown Kingston, Ontario.

We visited the theater to learn about its cultural contributions to the community and to take in a performance by the incredible Cirque Kalabante.

- Yeah, I mean, I would say, you know, certainly the, you know, the Grand on stage program itself.

I mean, it is a city of Kingston's supported presenting program.

You know, our, our role and our mandate really is to present arts that might not traditionally appear on stages in Kingston.

And we mix that with a wide variety of popular artists as well.

I mean, not only for fiscal reasons, but also for supporter and audience reasons.

We want those audiences coming back over and over again.

We want to continue to build on that loyalty, build that relationship between the Kingston Grand and the community.

It plays such a pivotal role in a lot of the community's cultural development.

You know, a lot of those young members in our city end up on our stage through a lot of the community productions that come through our door.

And that might be their first exposure to the Kingston Grand and they start to build a lifelong relationship with the facility.

I hear that all the time from patrons.

They love to tell their stories about the history with the venue and the connections they have with our venue.

I think that's what's really important about the Kingston Grand and its role within the city and within the community.

I think it's really, really very important to, to so many people here.

- Kingston Grand Theater is the home of two state-of-the-art venues, baby Grand Black Box Theater, a favorite among community theater groups and the Regina Rosen Auditorium, which hosts large scale productions, including the city of Kingston's Grand on stage program.

This fall, grand on stage enters its 18th season of presenting exciting culturally diverse performances.

- While definitely our, you know, our most active space would be the Baby Grand Theater.

It is very, very busy with community rentals.

We have lots of different theater and performance organizations that use that space with the city.

We have a residency program, which we started during the COVID time period when the venue was closed to public gatherings.

And we've continued that program moving forward where we invite local artists into our space for creative residencies and basically just to work on their programs and their art form.

So the Grand on Stage program is a multidisciplinary presenting program where we look for a wide diversity of performing arts to put on the Kingston Grand stage.

We're looking for programs that represent our community, where communities can see themselves on the stage, hear their stories, and and hear their voices.

That's very, very important to the city of Kingston and to the Grand On Stage program.

I'm definitely looking forward to the upcoming season.

This will be our 18th year for grand on stage.

We're offering close to 50 performances at the Kingston Grand.

We have a wide diversity of programs running between October and May.

Many of those shows are from around the world, which is really something I'm looking forward to having on our Kingston Grand Stage.

The strategies that we implement for attracting new audiences definitely comes back to the diversity of the programming.

We're constantly reviewing the performances that we offer, the makeup of our season, of the diversity of the programs that we offer and the presentations.

I think that's a big part of attracting a much broader and a more diverse audience to the Kingston Grand.

But we also mix that with bringing back many of our fan favorite artists and that certainly helps retain a lot of our most loyal patrons who look forward to seeing some of their their favorite performers on our Kingston Grand stage.

- Speaking of fan favorite artists returning to Kingston Grand Theater for their second sold out engagement.

Cirque Kalabante led by their founder and creative director, Yamoussa Bangoura, delighted the audience with West African singing and dancing alongside breathtaking acrobatic feats.

- My name is Yamoussa Bangoura.

I'm the artistic director and the founder of Cirque Kalabante.

We've been to Kingston before and this is our second time to be in the same theater.

And what's interesting in our show, every single show is the same show, but it's still different.

So you have the interaction with audience and it's always different.

So sometime you can do tricks, people react, and sometime you do things, people don't react, so you have to play with it.

You know, that's what make it interesting because you have always a challenge.

So for me, being the Grand Theater showed us how great we worked and how great we are.

You know, we used to play in the little on the street, on, you know, to doing like a promotion of the our show and now we like doing all the biggest theaters in the world, you know, so being in the grand theater of Kingston.

So we just happy, you know, to be here.

And that's why in our show, people see the smile and see happiness.

So the music we play come through the soul.

Yeah.

Come through the soul and to the soul.

- Yes.

From Kingston Grand Theater in downtown Kingston, Ontario for WPBS Weekly, I am Guy Carlo.

- For more information about the Kingston Grand Theater and its schedule of performances, visit Kingstongrand.ca Well straight from One World Kitchen comes a recipe for choppa pork tenderloin that is perfect for summer celebrations.

Chapa is an argentian technique of cooking food and a big cast iron surface over open wood fires.

But all you really need is a good cast iron skillet that's nice and hot, really hot so that the meat chars.

Go ahead and give this one a try.

- I can't wait to show you the sport dish.

My tip with working with them is to always remember to remove the silver skin on top because it makes it really tough.

I'm gonna be cooking this chapa style.

Chapa in Argentina is just a big cast iron and surface that we like to put on an open fire.

Now that the silver skin's out, I wanna add some flavor salt.

I wanna use core salt because it really helps to generate a beautiful crust and thyme.

I love thyme with pork and I wanna make sure that I cooks evenly, so I'm just gonna cut it in half before I add more flavor.

I love to use sugar with pork because it's one of those meats that goes great, sweet and sour.

And now for the perfect touch, those sweet and mellowed orange peels that I've preserved with olive oil, the time that is spent in the olive oil and that simmer, it just help intensify the oils of the orange peel.

And right now it's just screaming to go in my pan, a little more salt and wrap it up.

And I wanna wrap this very tight because I want all those flavors to be absorbed by the pork and I wanna do that in the fridge for a couple hours.

The secret to Chapa style is heat.

And when I mean heat, I mean a lot of heat.

Your pan needs to be burning.

This happens a lot.

Sugar, oil and fire make this amazing concussion with this nice view.

Now that I got this beautiful cross, I'm gonna lower the heat a little bit so we can cook straight in the pan.

This is all about fire and fun.

I'm so excited at that color.

The bright colors and popping taste of that salsa I mm, tender sweet, the punch of that really intense orange flavor.

Now with salsa, it breaks an extra crunch with pop of the pomegranate.

Now that is good chapa style.

- That's all for this Tuesday night.

Join us next time for a fresh look.

Inside the stories we sit down with Ashley Wilson of the Mental Health Association of Jefferson County.

Discover what services they provide to promote mental health and recovery.

Also, we celebrate the 200th anniversary of the Erie Canal with a special multi-part series.

Discover how the Canal helped those seeking freedom from slavery to escape into New York and Canada.

Meantime, if you have a story idea you'd like us to explore, we would love to learn more.

All you need to do is send us an email at WPBS weekly@wpbstv.org and we'll share it with the region.

That's it for now.

Everyone have a safe night.

We'll see you next time.

Take care.

- WPBS weekly Inside the stories is brought to you by - When you're unable to see your primary care provider.

The Carthage Walk-in Clinic is here for you, located off Route 26 across from Carthage Middle School.

Comfort and Healing close to home when you need it most - North Country Orthopedic Group is there for your urgent ortho or sports related injuries.

With our onsite surgical center and same or next day appointments, we're ready to provide care for patients of all ages.

Your health matters to us.

North Country Orthopedic Group, keeping healthcare local.

- We are the north country.

We're protecting one another like family is who we are and where our tomorrow will always be worth defending.

Find out how we keep the North Country Strong, at claxtonhepburn.org Today.

- Select musical performances are made possible with funds from the statewide community Regrant program, a regrant program of the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the office of the Governor and the New York state legislator administered by the St. Lawrence County Arts Council.

- Happy, you know, to be here.

And that's why in our show, people see the smile and see happiness.

So the music we play come through the soul.

Yeah.

Come through the soul and to the soul.

Yes.