Holy cow, talk about coincidence--just today I happened to have the opportunity to talk with a man who retired from the Naval Ordnance plant here in 1990, and one of the things he told me was that he had helped re-fit the cannon barrel of Old Ironsides so it could be set off for show.

Your post made me think of this song verse:
What do you do with a drunken sailor,
What do you do with a drunken sailor,
What do you do with a drunken sailor,
Ear-lie in the mor-nin'.