Today’s Laconia Daily Sun says that the deal to sell the Weirs has been dropped “after an initial study showed it to be in an archeologically important area where the potential for Native American artifacts could increase the costs of development. … If no buyer emerges, Baldi said there is even a chance she could re-open the drive-in next summer.”
On the Weirs Facebook page, management posted, “To my eye, this just looks like part of a larger negotiation process. How it will actually end is still unclear.”
Patricia Baldi said in a 2015 interview that the drive-in had been in the family for 40 years, and that hers was only the second family to own it. Let me turn to the Theatre Catalogs and Motion Picture Almanacs on my shelf to see what they say about the Weirs.
First, the Theatre Catalogs,
1949-50: not listed.
1952: owner H. Gaudet, capacity 500 vehicles.
1955-56: H. Gaudet and Affiliated Ths. Corp., 500.
One more note – anyone interested in the history of the Saco should check out Camille M. Smalley’s 2014 book, The Saco Drive-In: Cinema Under the Maine Sky. It’s available in ebook and dead-tree versions at the usual places.
Mike is right that I’ve been going through so many of these that I started thinking that everyone knew all the abbreviations and notes of these books. My apologies, and thanks to DI54 for pitching in. The cryptic abbreviations (other than IMPA) are what appeared in the books, which provided different levels of detail in different yearly editions.
The numbers at the end are vehicle capacity. Some of them could get very specific, since a drive-in owner knew exactly how many in-car speakers he had to maintain. But the first “75-150” in the 1953-54 edition of the Motion Picture Almanac (not International yet) looked like a hand-altered “75-” added to a previously laid-out 150. Out of hundreds of drive-ins, there were probably fewer than a dozen hyphenated ranges listed. I’d say that it was surprising that this uncertain number hung on for two decades, but inertia was a powerful force for those Almanac folks. As DI54 implies, these references are informative but not definitive.
On Google Maps, Pride’s Corner is marked at the intersection of Bridgton Road (US 302) and Brook Street just southeast of the drive-in. Wikipedia says there was a Prides Corner elementary school, closed May 2012, at that intersection.
That was the elder John Tevanian, who bought the Bridgton in 1971. His son, also John Tevanian, took over in 1996. He rebuilt the concession stand / projection booth in 2013 and installed digital projectors in time for the 2014 season.
A 2012 article in the Press Herald said that Doug Corson sold the Skowhegan to Donald C. Brown Jr. that year. It also said that Lockwood & Gordon Co. of Boston built the drive-in in 1954.
In January 2017, it posted to its Fundrazr page, “We’d like to thank all of the patrons of the Skowhegan Drive-In who helped us go digital. We didn’t get the full amount, but at least the amount we raised helped with the installation costs.”
Steve Ginn’s YouTube video has the full history of the Bangor. It opened on June 7, 1950.
The video claims that “(b)y the late 50’s it was an ‘adult’” theater, but more burlesque than porn. From the ads shown, this was just an occasional thing. A 1955 newspaper ad showed a nudist colony movie; a 1960 ad showed a stripper movie at midnight, and plenty of others had titles that sounded more lascivious than the movies really were.
Okay, there’s one 1970 newspaper ad with softcore porn. And one from 1974 with an X-rated second feature. But in between, there are plenty of multiplex-worthy movies. Based on the newspapers I checked separately, there were several full-time X-rated drive-ins in the area, but the Bangor wasn’t one of them.
A storm blew down the original screen on Jan. 8, 1978. It was replaced that year by the two screens that survive today.
AM Radio sound was added before the 1985 season, which is odd because the Bangor’s final night was July 23, 1985. By noon on the 25th, every speaker had been removed. The eight-screen Bangor Mall Cinemas, owned by the same company as the drive-in, opened on the 26th.
With the 2015 revival, capacity is about 250 for Screen One, about 160 for Screen Two.
BTW, the IMPA continued listing the Bangor Twin through its 1988 edition. Those guys sure were slow on the uptake sometimes!
A Times & Transcript article, copied into notes on a 2008 petition at GoPetition.com, said that then-owner Gilles LeBlanc’s father opened the Neptune in 1964, but Gilles was closing it and putting it up for sale. It didn’t mention the earlier closing but said “the drive-in started to fall on hard times in the 1980s”.
The Globe and Mail reported that in 2010, “a local business person bought the property and approached (Jeff) Coates with a suggestion to lease the drive-in business. After discussing the opportunity with (Robert) Farquharson, the duo decided to team up and leased the theatre in 2010.
“After a lapse of four years, the drive-in opened for a 17-week period in the summer of the same year.”
The Neptune’s web site was active in the summer of 2010, so we know it had been revived by then. The site had a note in June 2013 that the drive-in had gone digital.
The Open Air Cinema blog posted in 2009 that the Sussex opened in 1967, founded by Gerald Alexander and his family. They sold to Tom Boudreau, Paul Galloway and Randy Defazio in 2008.
For whatever reason, the Sussex never appeared in the IMPAs. That happens sometimes.
Owner Tom Boudreau told the Telegraph-Journal in May 2017 that the Sussex had never shut down and had been open for “50+ years.” He also said the drive-in’s capacity was “around 450,” reached twice in 2016.
My IMPAs suggest that the “mid-50s” opening estimate might be off a little. In my 1963 edition and going forward, they listed the Parkview (300) in Charlottetown along with the North River (450), but the Parkview wan’t there in the 1959 edition or earlier.
Note that the Cinema Treasures entry for the closed Madawaska Drive-In is under Upper Frenchville here.
Multiple sources say the Skylite opened in 1973, owned from its beginning by the Pelletier family, currently by Donna and Gary Pelletier. Here are my IMPA listings since then:
Historic Aerials shows a drive-in at 47.337 N, -68.376 W, now in Frenchville. That’s gotta be it. HA has a photo from 1981 and a topo map reference from 1986. (Also photos from 1996-97, then replaced by a building in 2007.) Oddly, it’s not on the 1973 topo map; that plus the IMPA hiatus make me wonder if we’re really talking about two different drive-ins.
The Google Street View from Sept. 2015 shows the site with a sign for CAN-AM Forest Products.
On the night of August 21 2010, thieves tied up an employee, stole the night’s proceeds and torched “the drive-in building” according to CTV News. No one was ever charged with that crime.
One year later to the day, fire broke out on a Sunday afternoon in the main building and burned through the roof (photo and story at Zone911.com).
A 2012 article in TVA Nouvelles said that Clément Longpré had owned the Mont-Saint-Hilaire for nearly eight years. André Monette was the co-owner during that time, at least.
Kevin Patenaude bought André Monette’s share of the drive-in in July 2017. (Or Monette had owned the whole thing at this point and Patenaude bought half ownership; I’m not sure.) There were nice articles about the change in ownership in L'Oeil Régional and Les Versants.
Mike Rivest makes the point elsewhere, but in case the reader starts on this page we should note that this is not the Ciné-Parc Boucherville that opened in 1970 and lived on the west side of the Boulevard de Montarville before closing in 1985.
Thanks for this map, showing the old ciné-parc’s location where Brasserie New Deal Brewing Co and several other buildings sit today. The current Ciné-Parc Boucherville is so close (3.6 km) to the old one, and uses the same highway exit, that it’s very easy to get confused.
The drive-in’s news page says it was opened in 1954, purchased by husband and wife Kevin Marshall and Kathy Lepine in 2014, and nothing in between. What do my Motion Picture Almanacs say?
1953-54: not listed.
1955: Drive-In, …, Twinex.
1959: Pembroke, 350, Twinex.
1963: Pembroke, 438, Twinex.
1969: Pembroke, 438.
1969: Skylight, … .
1972-76: Pembroke, 438. 1972-76: Skylight, 300.
Hmm! The MPAs aren’t perfect, but that would be a very long time to not notice a name change, plus there’s that discrepancy in capacity numbers.
Also, a January 2008 retrospective ramble in the Daily Observer included, “Pembroke’s first Drive-In Theatre afforded you the luxury of enjoying movies right in the comfort of the family car with a speaker slung from the window. … Residents of this area are now rediscovering this unique, outdoor movie adventure every summer at Matt McLaughlin’s Starlight Drive-In.” A 2016 Daily Observer article said the drive-in was built in 1954 on land “severed off farmland owned by the McLaughlin family,” and that Matt was the guy who sold it to the current owners.
Also, according to Cinema Treasures, Bryan Adams' Summer of 69 music video was shot at the about-to-be-demolished Chilliwack Drive-In in British Columbia. Sure, he was born in Kingston, but the Chilliwack sign in the video is pretty hard to miss.
Today’s Laconia Daily Sun says that the deal to sell the Weirs has been dropped “after an initial study showed it to be in an archeologically important area where the potential for Native American artifacts could increase the costs of development. … If no buyer emerges, Baldi said there is even a chance she could re-open the drive-in next summer.”
On the Weirs Facebook page, management posted, “To my eye, this just looks like part of a larger negotiation process. How it will actually end is still unclear.”
Patricia Baldi said in a 2015 interview that the drive-in had been in the family for 40 years, and that hers was only the second family to own it. Let me turn to the Theatre Catalogs and Motion Picture Almanacs on my shelf to see what they say about the Weirs.
First, the Theatre Catalogs,
1949-50: not listed.
1952: owner H. Gaudet, capacity 500 vehicles.
1955-56: H. Gaudet and Affiliated Ths. Corp., 500.
Now, my MPAs,
1953-54: H. Goubet (sic), 350.
1955-63: Mrs. H. B. Gaudet, 350.
1969-76: 350.
1982-88: L. Baldi.
Looks like Ms. Baldi is correct.
One more note – anyone interested in the history of the Saco should check out Camille M. Smalley’s 2014 book, The Saco Drive-In: Cinema Under the Maine Sky. It’s available in ebook and dead-tree versions at the usual places.
Mike is right that I’ve been going through so many of these that I started thinking that everyone knew all the abbreviations and notes of these books. My apologies, and thanks to DI54 for pitching in. The cryptic abbreviations (other than IMPA) are what appeared in the books, which provided different levels of detail in different yearly editions.
The numbers at the end are vehicle capacity. Some of them could get very specific, since a drive-in owner knew exactly how many in-car speakers he had to maintain. But the first “75-150” in the 1953-54 edition of the Motion Picture Almanac (not International yet) looked like a hand-altered “75-” added to a previously laid-out 150. Out of hundreds of drive-ins, there were probably fewer than a dozen hyphenated ranges listed. I’d say that it was surprising that this uncertain number hung on for two decades, but inertia was a powerful force for those Almanac folks. As DI54 implies, these references are informative but not definitive.
Here’s what’s on my shelf:
*Theatre Catalogs
1948-50: Eugene Boragine, 300.
1952-56: A. C. O'Neill and Herbert Higgins, 300
*(I)MPAs
1953-54: E. Borazin; Higgins, 75-150.
1955-59: Higgins Circuit, 75-150.
1963: Madison Theas. Co., 75-150.
1969-76: 75-150.
1982: SBC Mgt. Corp., 600.
1984-88: SBC Mgt. Corp.
On Google Maps, Pride’s Corner is marked at the intersection of Bridgton Road (US 302) and Brook Street just southeast of the drive-in. Wikipedia says there was a Prides Corner elementary school, closed May 2012, at that intersection.
My old, fallible reference books point to the renaming from the Danville to the Auburn in the late 50s / early 60s.
Theatre Catalog data, as listed as the Danville:
1949-50: Collin and Wood, 550.
1952: Lockwood and Gordon Ent., 450.
1955-56: Lockwood and Gordon Ent., and Daytz Theatre Ent., 450.
(I)MPA data:
1953-59: Danville, 450, Daytz Theatre Ent.
1963: Aubury (sic), 450, Daytz Theatre Ent.
1969-76: Auburn, 475.
1982: 300, SBC Mgt. Corp.
1984-88: SBC Mgt. Corp.
Only a few hints from my IMPAs:
1957-59: not listed.
1963: 300, Daytz-Walter Esley.
1969-76: 300.
1982: 300, J. Tevanian.
1984-88: J. Tevanian.
That was the elder John Tevanian, who bought the Bridgton in 1971. His son, also John Tevanian, took over in 1996. He rebuilt the concession stand / projection booth in 2013 and installed digital projectors in time for the 2014 season.
The IMPAs don’t give us much to talk about.
1955-63: 368, Somerset Drive-In Corp.
1969-76: 368.
1982: 300, SBC Mgt. Corp.
1984-88: SBC Mgt. Corp.
A 2012 article in the Press Herald said that Doug Corson sold the Skowhegan to Donald C. Brown Jr. that year. It also said that Lockwood & Gordon Co. of Boston built the drive-in in 1954.
In January 2017, it posted to its Fundrazr page, “We’d like to thank all of the patrons of the Skowhegan Drive-In who helped us go digital. We didn’t get the full amount, but at least the amount we raised helped with the installation costs.”
The same photo is on TripAdvisor with the credit “Photo provided by management (May 2016)”. Really nice picture, though.
Steve Ginn’s YouTube video has the full history of the Bangor. It opened on June 7, 1950.
The video claims that “(b)y the late 50’s it was an ‘adult’” theater, but more burlesque than porn. From the ads shown, this was just an occasional thing. A 1955 newspaper ad showed a nudist colony movie; a 1960 ad showed a stripper movie at midnight, and plenty of others had titles that sounded more lascivious than the movies really were.
Okay, there’s one 1970 newspaper ad with softcore porn. And one from 1974 with an X-rated second feature. But in between, there are plenty of multiplex-worthy movies. Based on the newspapers I checked separately, there were several full-time X-rated drive-ins in the area, but the Bangor wasn’t one of them.
A storm blew down the original screen on Jan. 8, 1978. It was replaced that year by the two screens that survive today.
AM Radio sound was added before the 1985 season, which is odd because the Bangor’s final night was July 23, 1985. By noon on the 25th, every speaker had been removed. The eight-screen Bangor Mall Cinemas, owned by the same company as the drive-in, opened on the 26th.
With the 2015 revival, capacity is about 250 for Screen One, about 160 for Screen Two.
BTW, the IMPA continued listing the Bangor Twin through its 1988 edition. Those guys sure were slow on the uptake sometimes!
The very short IMPA report:
1969: not listed.
1972-76: capacity 300.
A 2013 Global News video with Coates said the “40 year old” Neptune opened “in the early 70s,” which would account for the missing IMPA listing.
A Times & Transcript article, copied into notes on a 2008 petition at GoPetition.com, said that then-owner Gilles LeBlanc’s father opened the Neptune in 1964, but Gilles was closing it and putting it up for sale. It didn’t mention the earlier closing but said “the drive-in started to fall on hard times in the 1980s”.
The Globe and Mail reported that in 2010, “a local business person bought the property and approached (Jeff) Coates with a suggestion to lease the drive-in business. After discussing the opportunity with (Robert) Farquharson, the duo decided to team up and leased the theatre in 2010.
“After a lapse of four years, the drive-in opened for a 17-week period in the summer of the same year.”
The Neptune’s web site was active in the summer of 2010, so we know it had been revived by then. The site had a note in June 2013 that the drive-in had gone digital.
The Open Air Cinema blog posted in 2009 that the Sussex opened in 1967, founded by Gerald Alexander and his family. They sold to Tom Boudreau, Paul Galloway and Randy Defazio in 2008.
For whatever reason, the Sussex never appeared in the IMPAs. That happens sometimes.
Owner Tom Boudreau told the Telegraph-Journal in May 2017 that the Sussex had never shut down and had been open for “50+ years.” He also said the drive-in’s capacity was “around 450,” reached twice in 2016.
I saw another source that claimed 1950 as the opening year, but it didn’t show up in the MPAs until 1956 or 57.
1957-63: capacity 400, owned by Hazel and Barkhouse.
1969-76: 400.
My IMPAs suggest that the “mid-50s” opening estimate might be off a little. In my 1963 edition and going forward, they listed the Parkview (300) in Charlottetown along with the North River (450), but the Parkview wan’t there in the 1959 edition or earlier.
1957-59: not listed (only the North River).
1963: 300, Parkview Tourist Corp. Ltd.
1969-76: 300.
Note that the Cinema Treasures entry for the closed Madawaska Drive-In is under Upper Frenchville here.
Multiple sources say the Skylite opened in 1973, owned from its beginning by the Pelletier family, currently by Donna and Gary Pelletier. Here are my IMPA listings since then:
1972-76: not listed.
1978-82: Skylit, Pelletier, 395.
1984-88: Skylite, R. Pelletier.
Historic Aerials shows a drive-in at 47.337 N, -68.376 W, now in Frenchville. That’s gotta be it. HA has a photo from 1981 and a topo map reference from 1986. (Also photos from 1996-97, then replaced by a building in 2007.) Oddly, it’s not on the 1973 topo map; that plus the IMPA hiatus make me wonder if we’re really talking about two different drive-ins.
The Google Street View from Sept. 2015 shows the site with a sign for CAN-AM Forest Products.
Every listing I’ve seen has it in Madawaska ME.
The 1952-56 Theatre Catalogs show the Madawaska DI, E. Micheaud and Herbert Higgins, 300. Not listed in the 1949-50 edition.
Here’s what the (I)MPAs show:
1953-54: Drive-In, 300, Emile Michaud.
1955-63: Drive-In, 300, Emile Michand.
1969: Drive-In, 300.
1972-76: not listed.
1978-88: Madawaska DI, PO Box 259, “Eldon Stcyr” or “Eldon, St. Cyr.”, 300.
On the night of August 21 2010, thieves tied up an employee, stole the night’s proceeds and torched “the drive-in building” according to CTV News. No one was ever charged with that crime.
One year later to the day, fire broke out on a Sunday afternoon in the main building and burned through the roof (photo and story at Zone911.com).
A 2012 article in TVA Nouvelles said that Clément Longpré had owned the Mont-Saint-Hilaire for nearly eight years. André Monette was the co-owner during that time, at least.
Kevin Patenaude bought André Monette’s share of the drive-in in July 2017. (Or Monette had owned the whole thing at this point and Patenaude bought half ownership; I’m not sure.) There were nice articles about the change in ownership in L'Oeil Régional and Les Versants.
Mike Rivest makes the point elsewhere, but in case the reader starts on this page we should note that this is not the Ciné-Parc Boucherville that opened in 1970 and lived on the west side of the Boulevard de Montarville before closing in 1985.
Thanks for this map, showing the old ciné-parc’s location where Brasserie New Deal Brewing Co and several other buildings sit today. The current Ciné-Parc Boucherville is so close (3.6 km) to the old one, and uses the same highway exit, that it’s very easy to get confused.
The notes under its YouTube advertisement say it’s been open since 1974.
The drive-in’s news page says it was opened in 1954, purchased by husband and wife Kevin Marshall and Kathy Lepine in 2014, and nothing in between. What do my Motion Picture Almanacs say?
1953-54: not listed.
1955: Drive-In, …, Twinex.
1959: Pembroke, 350, Twinex.
1963: Pembroke, 438, Twinex.
1969: Pembroke, 438. 1969: Skylight, … .
1972-76: Pembroke, 438.
1972-76: Skylight, 300.
Hmm! The MPAs aren’t perfect, but that would be a very long time to not notice a name change, plus there’s that discrepancy in capacity numbers.
Also, a January 2008 retrospective ramble in the Daily Observer included, “Pembroke’s first Drive-In Theatre afforded you the luxury of enjoying movies right in the comfort of the family car with a speaker slung from the window. … Residents of this area are now rediscovering this unique, outdoor movie adventure every summer at Matt McLaughlin’s Starlight Drive-In.” A 2016 Daily Observer article said the drive-in was built in 1954 on land “severed off farmland owned by the McLaughlin family,” and that Matt was the guy who sold it to the current owners.
Also, according to Cinema Treasures, Bryan Adams' Summer of 69 music video was shot at the about-to-be-demolished Chilliwack Drive-In in British Columbia. Sure, he was born in Kingston, but the Chilliwack sign in the video is pretty hard to miss.