Fourth of July Fireworks in Tri-Cities, Tennessee

The four towns' shows

Johnson City's Independence Day Celebration at Freedom Hall Civic Center has run forty years: music, food trucks and kids' stuff from late afternoon, fireworks at 10. Across town the Doughboys play a Fourth of July home game at TVA Credit Union Ballpark with fireworks after the last out, around 9:30, so a Johnson City family can do baseball and still catch the big show from the parking lot.

Kingsport's Red, White & Boom takes over downtown from 5 p.m., fireworks after dark. Then, three weeks later, Fun Fest closes its nine days with the Eastman Fireworks Spectacular at J. Fred Johnson Stadium, synced to music — if you're not in the stadium, Fort Henry Drive by Memorial Park and the Fort Henry Mall lot are the free seats.

Bristol does it in one evening: Believe in Bristol's Star-Spangled Parade down State Street at 5 — Regions Bank to Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, both states watching from the curb — then the city's Stars & Stripes Celebration at Anderson Street Park, live music until the fireworks.

Jonesborough Days fills the Fourth and the day before it — Tennessee's oldest town's birthday party since the 1970s — and ends with fireworks at 10 launched from behind the Washington County Library. The town publishes an exit map every year for a reason: take the marked routes out and you'll be home before the smoke clears.

The lake and the smaller towns

Watauga Lake's marinas each shoot their own show on different nights around the Fourth, and a boat parade gathers at the dam on the Fourth itself — three shows in one long weekend if you have a boat or a friend with one. Elizabethton's Independence Day celebration ends with the city's biggest show of the year, then does fireworks again in late September, when Covered Bridge Days launches them off the East Elk Avenue bridge. The smaller towns each have a night; the cards below carry them.

Timing, parking, getting out

• Shows go at 9:30 to 10. Be parked an hour before; the exit takes about as long as the fireworks did.
• Freedom Hall and the ballpark share the same few roads. Pick one side of Johnson City and stay there.
• Bristol's parade closes State Street from late afternoon; park on the Virginia side and walk over.
• Jonesborough is a small town holding a big crowd. The exit map is not a suggestion.
• It's 80 degrees at dusk in July here, not 60 like the mountains. Water, not a jacket.

Lighting your own: two states, three sets of rules

Tennessee allows consumer fireworks — firecrackers, rockets, the works — which is why the tents cluster on the Tennessee side of State Street every June. Virginia allows only sparklers, fountains and other ground-based devices; anything that explodes or leaves the ground is illegal there, and hauling Tennessee fireworks back across the line is the classic Bristol mistake. The cities add their own rules on top: Bristol, Tennessee bans possessing, using or selling fireworks inside the city limits without the fire chief's authorization, Bristol, Virginia follows state law, and Johnson City and Kingsport each restrict where and when. Check your town's ordinance before you light anything, and watch for burn bans in a dry July.

Below: this year's Fourth of July fireworks and celebrations from our calendar, each linking to the town or venue that runs it. What returns every year is at the bottom.