I remember being there July 4th, 1976.. of course, I was 7, so the things I remember most about the trip to Disneyworld are getting a stuffed Dale character, and a toy musket. Can't remember a lick about the fireworks. Being 7, I am not sure a Bicentennial meant all that much to me at that age...

I was in NYC this past July 4.  There are two simulataneous fireworks shows for Manhattan, one at 34th Street and one further north.  From our position in Brooklyn we could see both.  They were remarkably in synch.

Does the 35,000 figure refer to both shows or to each?

I'd guess both.

One of the great "fireworks experiences" at Disneyland that went away with the inception of "Fantasmic!" was what insiders only knew about--the nightly "Fireworks Cruise" of the Mark Twain. Those in the know would ask a deckhand/dockhand cast member sometime in the afternoon on summer nights what time "the fireworks cruise" was departing--it varied from night to night but was usually around 8:30-8:45 to time to the 9pm fireworks show. What happened was that for that ONE cruise per night, the Twain didn't just circle the Rivers of America and come back--it STOPPED way back on the far side of Tom Sawyer's Island very near the mock indian village, and thus put guests UNDER the fireworks show that other park visitors viewed from Main Street and the hub in the "classic Castle view" but the actual launch point was backstage very near the spot where the Twain rested--indeed the original reason for the stop was so that the end of the cruise would not put the boat and its open decks under any potentially dangerous debris from the exploding pyro shells. Anyhow, they would channel the fireworks soundtrack through the Mark Twain's PA system too, but for that 15 minutes or so of darkness waiting, it was a really unusual moment because you truly felt miles away from the big city and in the "wilderness" out there in the dark without the Twain moving and only the soft "thump-thump-thump-thump" of its idling steam engine and the pre-recorded chanting of the "indians" of the village on the shore to accompany the very real birds, frogs, and nighttime insect noises. Then, the pyro would start, seemingly directly overhead, and framed only by the tall trees instead of the castle spires. Usually there were only a small number of guests on board, mostly "regulars" who knew about the deal, because other folks were warned that "This trip will be longer so if you are hurrying to other attractions, you may want to wait" and didn't board most of the time. One other note: In those days, without the distractions, the voices of the recorded indian chanters seemed to be saying a very inhospitable thing when you transliterated their native-american languages into what-does-that-sound-like English: "Go a way-hay go-a-wayy-yayyy-go-ah-way-ay..." over and over. With drums. And then...fireworks!  All of this stopped when Fantasmic was begun because at night the Twain was converted over for its part in that show AND because the area where the original indian village had been was reworked to put the docks for the Fantasmic! floats behind it (and to add a more complex "storyteller" animatronic figure to the set) and all Twain trips stop at dusk ever since to allow for that Fantasmic! conversion time and, of course, the addition of the Twain's OWN pyro pinwheels and effects for the show.

I've had the good fortune of attending two WDW July 4th fireworks shows in the last few years, and they were spectacular. Still, the greatest fireworks show I've seen was the one that coincided with the Pirate and Princess Party this past May. My dad and I watched it from Narcosse's, and it was the greatest combination of pyrotechnics and story telling I have ever seen.

I really miss the extra festivities of the Millennium Celebration; the cultural aspects of it were more moving than how many fireworks were set off in a 5-minute timespan... I miss the Tapestry of Nations parade!

The Tapestry of Nations/Dreams may be my favorite parade ever. Something about it just really clicked with me.