New Haven Drive-In

Great memories growing up nearby and slipping in through the back fence with one or two other 14 yr-olds to experience films like M.A.S.H., Gimme Shelter, Night of the Living Dead, Catch 22, the Hells Angels films, Little Big Man, and Pretty Maids All in a Row. Used to get chased away, at times, by a lady who drove a Studebaker Lark around the big lot, and would nail us with her high beams. We always stopped by for the great stuff at Dino’s down Washington Av! Kinda sad to drive by 20 years later and see no trace of either, as if they never existed, an experience many around the country surely had on the outskirts of their towns back then.

This drive-in seemed to have the same kind of booking policy as the BOWL D.I. West Haven and POST D.I. East Haven: these three ringed New Haven and could pull kids from surrounding towns. Their ads in the New Haven Register/Journal Courier [yes, New Haven had a morning AND evening paper back then] were clustered together on the movie page and the name-banners were similar. It was not uncommon for local theaters to form loose co-op booking entities to give them greater leverage with distributors—-this was still the era of “states rights” distribution, independents releasing through regional distributors. For Connecticut, Boston was the locus of the New England region: Crest Films, Hallmark Releasing, etc. Always full, height of the 1960s drive-in boom. A lot of us got our fingers wet for the first time in these drive-ins. The New Haven had a more conventional booking policy in comparison with the POST—–everybody was conventional next to the POST. Drive In days 1960s, gone forever.

does anyone have any old pictures of this drive in?