November 8 is "Furigo (bellows) Festival" day. Every year, shrines and sites associated with bellows hold their own ceremonies.
"Furigo"—quite a few older people still know what a bellows actually is. Blacksmiths used them to raise the temperature of charcoal or coal fires when working iron and metal—a human-powered forced-air device, in modern terms. Designs ranged from bags of tanuki or sheep leather inflated and squeezed to send air, to large box types worked like hand pumps.
On the festival day, smiths, casters, bathhouse operators, and others who handled fire would rest from work, visit Inari shrines, paste charms at their workplaces, purify their bellows, and offer sacred sake and rice cakes to pray for prosperous business and a safe year. Then they treated participants and neighborhood children to mandarin oranges. Children competed to get furigo-festival oranges because eating them was said to prevent colds and measles. Ki no Kuni-ya Bunzaemon spotted this Edo custom and is said to have made a fortune shipping specialty mandarins from Kii by boat through storms.
Several theories explain the festival's origin. One is the Emperor Jimmu legend. When Jimmu prayed to the sun from Takachiho Peak to subdue many enemies to the east, a crow (Yatagarasu?) guided him eastward; many retainers rushed to join. Jimmu ordered the smith Ame-no-Mahara to forge a thousand swords and a thousand axes; another crow flew in bearing a round chain, which Jimmu gave Mahara, and bellows and other tools fell from heaven. That day was November 8. Mahara quickly built a forge and presented everything ordered; Jimmu granted him the heavenly name as patron of smithing, and November 8 became the smiths' bellows festival.
Another tale says a smith hid a man in his bellows. Resting from work on November 8, a man who looked like a criminal burst into the forge asking to be hidden from pursuers. The smith put him inside a large bellows, tied a sacred rope, and offered sake and lamp light. When many pursuers came, they tried to search inside the bellows; the smith refused: "Today is the bellows festival—if you wish to inspect inside, wait until tomorrow." After they left, the man was gone. The smith prospered and grew rich—thus the festival began.
At Palaceside Building in Takebashi, Tokyo, the festival was held that afternoon. An altar was set before the boiler inside the round shed; participants offered tamagushi and prayed for safety and prosperous business. Mandarins were served, of course.