Rock Road Drive-In
6898 St. Charles Rock Road,
Pagedale,
MO
63133
6898 St. Charles Rock Road,
Pagedale,
MO
63133
4 people
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Mÿ Uncle Herb owned this Drive-In. He eventually was involved in something of a landmark court case in 1971 over the content of the films he showed. Feel free to Google “Herb Hartstein vs. Missouri Supreme Court” if you would like to read the whole details of the case.
Opened on 3/7/1962 with “The Snow Queen”, “A thunder of drums” and “village of the damned”. Opened as Rock Road Drive-in on 27/5/1977 with “The house by the lake” and “Strange shadows in an empty room”.
Boxoffice, July 13, 1970: “The Pagedale Board of Aldermen again turned down an application for an operators' license by the Olympic Drive-In. According to City Atty. Paul J. Boll, the theatre has operated without a license for several years.”
Added an ad for the grand opening of the Drive In as Rock Road Drive-In on May 27, 1977
From the Oct. 20, 1965 Motion Picture Exhibitor: “The Olympic Drive-In on St. Charles Rock Road in the County has been the target of frequent raids by police and of a newly formed decent films committee in an attempt to close the theatre for allegedly showing obscene films.”
Even more update… The marquee no longer there
Listings in the Motion Picture Almanac give a capacity of 865 cars.
In addition to the battles with Pagedale, the U. S. Olympic Committee, in 1968 and again in 1974, notified the venue that the use of the name “Olympic” violated a 1950 federal law. Olympic was the drive-in’s name until it closed Nov. 30, 1976. When it reopened under Wehrenberg management in May 1977, it had become the Rock Road.
Yeah, the description needs a bit more cleanup.
Opened showing mainstream Switched to porn and the trouble with the city occurred Wehrenberg took over in 1977 and it stopped showing porn Closed in 1980 and now a junkyard
Overview mis-states when “porn” movies were being shown. Films of “racy” genre were a staple long before Wehrenberg took over operation.
Facts on this drive-in need to be corrected. It opened as Olympic. Name changed to Rock Road when Wehrenberg took over in 1977 and it closed in 1980.
The Herbert Hartstein mentioned in a previous comment who owned this theater happened to be my late Uncle Herb. :)
This opened on July 3rd, 1962. Grand opening ad in photo section.
Ha ha…. I remember going there to watch “Naughty” Movies.
I found an Olympic speaker at a garage sale, and bought it for a dollar… I held onto it for the longest time. Wish I still had it now.
Uploaded some horror triple feature ads from the Olympic in the early 60’s. I hadn’t thought about the fact that the Olympic was almost completely surrounded by graveyards, which would be perfect for horror movies!
Why is there no mention of the time when the Olympic Drive-in showed horror movies? I remember going there with my big brother and being scared watching the horror movies with the graveyard next to it.
I went to the Olympic drive-In sometime in 1964, age 17 on a double date. Not knowing what was being shown at the time I saw my first porn movie. At least part of it until it was raided by the police. When the flood lights came on you could see traffic on St Charles Rock Road was slowing down to a crawl looking at the screen and the hill side outside the fence next to the train tracks was lined with non paying bystanders. We were escorted off of the property by the police and the Drive In gave us all a rain check {Free Olympic Pass} which I still have today. An experience I will never forget.
The Rock Road marquee (not the Olympic) remained pretty much intact for quite a few years after the drive-in closed and the car junkyard took over, but I believe it is completely gone now. The screen came down several years before the marquee. They have blocked off the entrance from St Charles Rock Road, and I think you enter the junkyard from a side street now. Sadly, it’s pretty much unrecognizable as a drive-in now
Pics, ads and newspaper articles about the then ongoing battle between local authorites and the operator of the Olympic Drive-In here: St. Louis Flashback Movie & Drive-In Theatres
Also, factual information needs to be updated. Opened as Olympic. Changed to Rock Road in 1977 (per Jerry Alexander’s earlier post in this thread).
What’s left of the marquee is still standing, I believe. I think the screen is completely gone now.
I saw everything from mainstream (Saturday Night Fever) to Blaxploitation (Coffy, J.D.’s Revenge), to even a way out triple feature consisting of one of those Bruce Li (remember him – the Bruce Lee knockoff who they pushed after Lee died!) kung fu flicks and 2 hardcore prison movies.
The one thing I DON’T remember seeing during the Weherenberg era: PORN.
In a nutshell, Pagedale was considered The City (St. Louis code word for “The Hood”) so whatever that particular demographic wanted to see, they got it.
Did Wehrenberg change the type of movies shown at the Olympic/Rock Road when they operated it? Wehrenberg usually didn’t show those types of pictures at their theaters (Mid-America did) and they probably changed the name to Rock Road to avoid the stigma of being associated with the Olympic.
My wife and I went past what’s left of this place when we took the Metrolink to a Cardinals game in late June. It’s just a junk yard now. But the stories I bet some of the cars now on that lot could tell…
Wehrenberg took over the Olympic,renamed it the Rock Road and reopened in May 1977. Final night of operation was is November 1980.
Capacity of 700 cars.
Here is a 1969 lawsuit regarding the adult films:
http://tinyurl.com/yvxn4l
Venue opened July 3, 1962.
Architect was James Willingham.
Original owners & operators were Mr. & Mrs. Herbert Hartstein and associates.
When the movie got boring, one could always watch the Wabash streamliners whiz by. That trackage is now the Metrolink route to Lambert Field.