Sundowner Drive-In
Anchorage,
AK
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Located next to the indoor Fireweed Theater (now the Fireweed 7 Cinemas), this drive-in opened in 1969 and closed in the early-1980’s. It has since been demolished. The Sundowner Drive-In was one of three drive-in theaters once located in Anchorage, the other two being the 360 Drive-In and the Billiken Drive-In (both also long gone).
Any additional information on the Sundowner would be appreciated.
Contributed by
Bryan
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Recent comments (view all 11 comments)
On the other hand, being close to “The Land of the Midnight Sun” must have led to some awfully late starting times for shows in June and July!
The projection booth for the drive in was the same one for the main screen, just the machines where pointed to the rear. The drive in was closed when i worked for wometco, it’s former space was the lower parking lot for the Fireweed
Crime in Alaska, 1976:
http://tinyurl.com/2mbbyy
The 1981 IMPA gives the capacity as 600 cars. Operator was Wometco Theaters at that time. This was the only drive-in listed in Alaska. In 1963 the state didn’t have a listing in the IMPA. In 1970 the Sundowner and the Pillikin Drive-In are listed, both in Anchorage.
On June 3, 1974 Savoy Brown played an outdoor concert at the Sundowner Drive In. Their opening act was a relatively new band called Kiss!
A stage was built in front of the movie screen. We had to wait until almost 11PM for the show to start since the bands arrived at 10:00 on the Northwest flight from Seattle. The sun didn’t set until midnight so the first part of the show was in daylight.
I also spent many night at this drive-in…Late nights to be sure but great memories..
If anyone has any phots, would love to see them..
Me too!
Ken mc, that crime story is funny stuff.
Ken Mc.great stuff.
I just wonder how a drive-in could operate in Alaska. In winter, it is too cold to go to a drive-in, and in summer, with so many hours of daylight, I imagine they had to start very late. I worked at drive-ins in Richmond, Virginia, and in the summer it was nine o'clock or later before we could start. And most of our drive-ins closed up in the winter.