Historic Aerials' topo maps for 1957-69 show two drive-ins across Route 66 from each other. Based on Daniel’s descriptions, the one to the east was probably the 66 Drive-In. This would have been the other one, west of the highway and south of Hermosa Road, but was it called the Indian?
The Motion Picture Almanac series mentions only two drive-ins, ever, for Holbrook. One was the 66, and the other was the Western Star, capacity 200, owned by Robert Young. The Western Star was listed in the 1956-59 editions of the MPA, then fell off in 1960, the same as its competitor across the highway.
Daniel is right. There were two drive-ins almost across Route 66 from each other, according to Historic Aerials' topo maps. The 1957-69 maps all show that one was due south of the airport at the end(!) of Hermosa Drive east of Route 66, and from Daniel’s description, I’ll guess it’s the 66. The other was on the west side of Route 66 just south of Hermosa, matching where Daniel says the Indian Drive-In had been.
By the 1997 aerial photo, I-40 was running through what had been the 66 Drive-In site.
The 1955-56 Theatre Catalog lists only the 66 for Holbrook. It showed capacity 400, owner Harry L. Nace. The Motion Picture Almanac series first mentioned it in its 1956 edition, capacity 300, owner Harry Nace. It stayed that way through the 1959 edition, then dropped off the list in 1960, never to return. Did it close so soon, or did it get overlooked?
Based on photos from Historic Aerials, the entrance was on Route 66 about 925 feet west of the intersection with Sakelares. What’s left of the marquee was still visible on Google Street View as of June 2018 in the middle of what is now the entrance to a Waste Management Hauling facility.
The screen faced south in the 1971 aerial photo, in which the back rows already looked untended. The 1973 topo map shows a drive-in there, but by the 1981 photo, the screen is gone and the southern half of the field is being used by another business.
I guess someone needs to add a Cinema Treasures entry for J.C. West’s other drive-in in Grants: the Trail. Historic Aerials shows it in 1955, screen facing north, in the middle of nowhere off Route 66 just west of town. Now there’s a sizable residential area around its intact (no screen) remains behind the Immanuel Baptist Church on Valencia Avenue. The 1981 aerial photo shows it still looking good, though the screen was gone by the 1997 photo.
Motion Picture Almanac mentions for Grants NM:
1955-59: The Trail DI, capacity 225, owned by J.C. West
1960-62: Both the Trail and the "Schara" (sic) capacity 275, also J.C. West
1963-66: Trail and Sahara, still J.C. West
1969-76: Trail and Sahara, no owner info
1977-79: Only the Trail, capacity 200, owner Grants Inc.
Photos of the site at Historic Aerials verify that the drive-in existed there in 1962-1981. The next photo, 1997, shows that by then the elementary school lot had already carved out the south side of the drive-in viewing area.
Motion Picture Almanac mentions:
1960-66, capacity 578, Frontier Theas.
1969-76, capacity 578, (no owner info in these lists)
1977-88, capacity 300, Commonwealth
The higher capacity number came from a time when a drive-in operator knew exactly how many speakers he had to maintain. The 1981 photo still showed the full-sized viewing area, so it’s possible that Commonwealth understated it.
Its last listing in the Motion Picture Almanac series was the 1959 edition, showing capacity 249, run by Frontier Theaters. In Gallup, the 1960 MPA showed only the Zuni, a larger drive-in on the other side of town and also run by Frontier.
Today, the local Daily Herald ran photos of “15 fun places in Utah County that sadly only exist in your memories”. One of them was of the dismantling of the Pioneer in 2002. According to the caption, the drive-in “closed in the summer of 2001 after owners Marv and Jeanie Cox sold the land.”
In its 25 Years Ago Today notes, the Union Bulletin of Walla Walla wrote that the Port of Walla Walla bought the 27-acre “Sky-Vu” site for $425,000 from Sterling Theater Co. Inc. on Feb. 2, 1994.
That E.C. Houck was Corbin Eugene “Red” Houck who passed away on Jan. 22, 2019. According to his obituary in the Waco Tribune-Herald, “Eugene started working in the theater business. He owned the Joy Drive-In Theater and the Joy Theater downtown that was destroyed in the 1953 Waco tornado. He then went into the nursery and landscaping business with his father, Corbin Houck …”
Yet another indication of how slow the International Motion Picture Almanacs were at removing listings: We know exactly when it closed (in 1984), but the Lee Highway stayed on the IMPA drive-in list through the list’s final edition in 1988.
The Tysons Reporter recently ran a brief story about the site, drawing on Fairfax County’s aerial photography. The Reporter said that it was “the Washington area’s largest drive-in theater”.
“The theater featured a 50×120′ CinemaScope screen and a rotunda-style dining area. At its capacity [sic] in 1983, the drive-in could fit 1,353 cars.”
The story continues that it was closed in 1984, replaced by a nearby indoor multiplex. That site was redeveloped into the Mosaic District, which includes the 8-screen Angelika Film Center.
There’s another great article, with a ton of very nice photos, in yesterday’s Houston Herald. Here are a few new details:
Long-time Texas County residents Josh and Jennifer Shelton took ownership of the business in June 2018. The Faith Fellowship youth group painted the projection / concession building on Day One.
The Phoenix “can accommodate close to 150 vehicles”. It still uses FM sound, and there was no reference to leftover speakers.
“The drive-in was open on weekends during the holiday season, and will operate on a week-by-week basis until re-opening for good in the spring and showing movies into late fall.” Since the indoor theater operates pretty much all year, the drive-in appears to run whenever weather permits.
MagicValley.com reported that the drive-in’s fence was down and the screen would be dismantled around the end of the year. It was to become a storage facility. The article said that the Motor-Vu was built in 1947 and began operating in 1948.
This October, the site is transformed into “The Deserted Drive-In” for an interactive Zombie Resistance experience. http://www.basetactics.com/zombie-resistance-2018/
Also, based on an August 2018 Google Street View, the drive-in looks like it’s still in pretty good shape and is available for lease from HFL Corporation, 814-238-4000. https://goo.gl/maps/5vdicC6KBE72
There was a long retrospective article in the Reno Gazette Journal this month. Some highlights:
“Tony Pecetti, a bigger-than-life accordionist and entertainment entrepreneur in town, opened the El Rancho Drive-In on Aug. 19, 1950.” He died in 1969. “In 1973, the Syufy Enterprises, now run by brothers Ray and Joe Syufy of San Rafael, Calif., purchased the drive-in.”
In 1993, it was “scheduled to be torn down and turned into a flea market and indoor theater complex.” No mention of how the El Rancho dodged that one.
“The screens, varying in size, are steel and wood, never replaced since first installment, though three were add-ons through the years.”
It’s currently run by General Manager Diego Maldonado, who lives on-site with his family.
The Cecil Whig newspaper recently wrote a short retrospective. A couple of quotes:
Nathan Rosen had carefully located the new enterprise by finding a suitable tract, one large enough for 700 cars, on the new dual highway. The 15 acres were leased from the Society of the Divine Savior, a Catholic order popularly known as Salvatorians.
The lease was transferred to Reba and Muriel Schwartz in March 1960. The new owners were experienced motion picture operators … Local papers reported they were putting the Elk in first-class condition for the spring opening. The drive-in closed in the early 1980s, and in 1984 the property was sold.
Its Facebook page says it failed to open for the 2014 season. On April 7, 2014, they wrote, “We are sorry to say the Way-Bak-Wyn Drive-In will not be open in the summer of 2014. We will miss our wonderful customers. Thanks for all your support during our short run. The age of digital has come and we just can’t afford to upgrade our equipment.”
Google Earth shows the site overgrown with trees, but the screen and sign are both in there. Here’s a picture from March 2018: https://www.flickr.com/photos/29276830@N02/27505498688/
The Baytown Sun had a column about the Decker this week. It’s behind a (cough) paywall (cough, view page source).
Anyway, the opening date was given as March 29, 1949. The Decker covered 10 acres and had room for 575 cars, plus 50 seats near the 50-foot-wide screen. The second screen was added in “the mid 70’s”.
For more info, you might contact the column’s author, Russell Hamman, at his Facebook group Baytown History with a Twist.
As of a July 26 Facebook post, “The drive in is still up for grabs! Have had so many wonderful people interested, however for many different reasons it has fallen through.”
Sioux Falls historian Eric Renshaw wrote an extensive history of the “Star-Lite Drive-in” for the Sept. 14, 2018 Argus Leader. If that link is alive when you read this, you should check it out.
Otherwise, here are a few summary details from that article:
It was built by Joe Floyd and his company, Welworth Theatres. The work was done by Roy Runyeon.
The original 38 by 56-foot screen was "the largest theater screen in South Dakota" at the time.
Original capacity was 650 cars with expansion room for 200 more.
After the East Park Drive-In closed in 1978 (K-Mart), a second screen at the Star-Lite opened May 16, 1979. It featured radio sound.
The drive-in's final active night was July 5, 1985.
John Nathan Sawaya passed away on October 19 1987, at age 63. The Peak was still listed in the International Motion Picture Almanac’s final drive-in survey in early 1988. Based on Anthony L. Vazquez-Hernandez’s photo comment, that’s probably when the Peak closed permanently.
The Starlite was down to a single active screen by the time I (Carload.com) started running its movie listings in the late 1990s. It was definitely still alive in 2012, but had closed by 2015.
Historic Aerials' topo maps for 1957-69 show two drive-ins across Route 66 from each other. Based on Daniel’s descriptions, the one to the east was probably the 66 Drive-In. This would have been the other one, west of the highway and south of Hermosa Road, but was it called the Indian?
The Motion Picture Almanac series mentions only two drive-ins, ever, for Holbrook. One was the 66, and the other was the Western Star, capacity 200, owned by Robert Young. The Western Star was listed in the 1956-59 editions of the MPA, then fell off in 1960, the same as its competitor across the highway.
Daniel is right. There were two drive-ins almost across Route 66 from each other, according to Historic Aerials' topo maps. The 1957-69 maps all show that one was due south of the airport at the end(!) of Hermosa Drive east of Route 66, and from Daniel’s description, I’ll guess it’s the 66. The other was on the west side of Route 66 just south of Hermosa, matching where Daniel says the Indian Drive-In had been.
By the 1997 aerial photo, I-40 was running through what had been the 66 Drive-In site.
The 1955-56 Theatre Catalog lists only the 66 for Holbrook. It showed capacity 400, owner Harry L. Nace. The Motion Picture Almanac series first mentioned it in its 1956 edition, capacity 300, owner Harry Nace. It stayed that way through the 1959 edition, then dropped off the list in 1960, never to return. Did it close so soon, or did it get overlooked?
Based on photos from Historic Aerials, the entrance was on Route 66 about 925 feet west of the intersection with Sakelares. What’s left of the marquee was still visible on Google Street View as of June 2018 in the middle of what is now the entrance to a Waste Management Hauling facility.
The screen faced south in the 1971 aerial photo, in which the back rows already looked untended. The 1973 topo map shows a drive-in there, but by the 1981 photo, the screen is gone and the southern half of the field is being used by another business.
I guess someone needs to add a Cinema Treasures entry for J.C. West’s other drive-in in Grants: the Trail. Historic Aerials shows it in 1955, screen facing north, in the middle of nowhere off Route 66 just west of town. Now there’s a sizable residential area around its intact (no screen) remains behind the Immanuel Baptist Church on Valencia Avenue. The 1981 aerial photo shows it still looking good, though the screen was gone by the 1997 photo.
Motion Picture Almanac mentions for Grants NM:
Photos of the site at Historic Aerials verify that the drive-in existed there in 1962-1981. The next photo, 1997, shows that by then the elementary school lot had already carved out the south side of the drive-in viewing area.
Motion Picture Almanac mentions:
The higher capacity number came from a time when a drive-in operator knew exactly how many speakers he had to maintain. The 1981 photo still showed the full-sized viewing area, so it’s possible that Commonwealth understated it.
Its last listing in the Motion Picture Almanac series was the 1959 edition, showing capacity 249, run by Frontier Theaters. In Gallup, the 1960 MPA showed only the Zuni, a larger drive-in on the other side of town and also run by Frontier.
Today, the local Daily Herald ran photos of “15 fun places in Utah County that sadly only exist in your memories”. One of them was of the dismantling of the Pioneer in 2002. According to the caption, the drive-in “closed in the summer of 2001 after owners Marv and Jeanie Cox sold the land.”
The local Daily Herald ran a photo today showing a Track Hoe pushing over the Art City’s screen. The photo was dated 2002.
In its 25 Years Ago Today notes, the Union Bulletin of Walla Walla wrote that the Port of Walla Walla bought the 27-acre “Sky-Vu” site for $425,000 from Sterling Theater Co. Inc. on Feb. 2, 1994.
That E.C. Houck was Corbin Eugene “Red” Houck who passed away on Jan. 22, 2019. According to his obituary in the Waco Tribune-Herald, “Eugene started working in the theater business. He owned the Joy Drive-In Theater and the Joy Theater downtown that was destroyed in the 1953 Waco tornado. He then went into the nursery and landscaping business with his father, Corbin Houck …”
Yet another indication of how slow the International Motion Picture Almanacs were at removing listings: We know exactly when it closed (in 1984), but the Lee Highway stayed on the IMPA drive-in list through the list’s final edition in 1988.
The Tysons Reporter recently ran a brief story about the site, drawing on Fairfax County’s aerial photography. The Reporter said that it was “the Washington area’s largest drive-in theater”.
“The theater featured a 50×120′ CinemaScope screen and a rotunda-style dining area. At its capacity [sic] in 1983, the drive-in could fit 1,353 cars.”
The story continues that it was closed in 1984, replaced by a nearby indoor multiplex. That site was redeveloped into the Mosaic District, which includes the 8-screen Angelika Film Center.
There’s another great article, with a ton of very nice photos, in yesterday’s Houston Herald. Here are a few new details:
Long-time Texas County residents Josh and Jennifer Shelton took ownership of the business in June 2018. The Faith Fellowship youth group painted the projection / concession building on Day One.
The Phoenix “can accommodate close to 150 vehicles”. It still uses FM sound, and there was no reference to leftover speakers.
“The drive-in was open on weekends during the holiday season, and will operate on a week-by-week basis until re-opening for good in the spring and showing movies into late fall.” Since the indoor theater operates pretty much all year, the drive-in appears to run whenever weather permits.
MagicValley.com reported that the drive-in’s fence was down and the screen would be dismantled around the end of the year. It was to become a storage facility. The article said that the Motor-Vu was built in 1947 and began operating in 1948.
KEZJ reported that workers were demolishing the site in December 2018.
This October, the site is transformed into “The Deserted Drive-In” for an interactive Zombie Resistance experience. http://www.basetactics.com/zombie-resistance-2018/
Also, based on an August 2018 Google Street View, the drive-in looks like it’s still in pretty good shape and is available for lease from HFL Corporation, 814-238-4000. https://goo.gl/maps/5vdicC6KBE72
There was a long retrospective article in the Reno Gazette Journal this month. Some highlights:
“Tony Pecetti, a bigger-than-life accordionist and entertainment entrepreneur in town, opened the El Rancho Drive-In on Aug. 19, 1950.” He died in 1969. “In 1973, the Syufy Enterprises, now run by brothers Ray and Joe Syufy of San Rafael, Calif., purchased the drive-in.”
In 1993, it was “scheduled to be torn down and turned into a flea market and indoor theater complex.” No mention of how the El Rancho dodged that one.
“The screens, varying in size, are steel and wood, never replaced since first installment, though three were add-ons through the years.”
It’s currently run by General Manager Diego Maldonado, who lives on-site with his family.
The Cecil Whig newspaper recently wrote a short retrospective. A couple of quotes:
Nathan Rosen had carefully located the new enterprise by finding a suitable tract, one large enough for 700 cars, on the new dual highway. The 15 acres were leased from the Society of the Divine Savior, a Catholic order popularly known as Salvatorians.
The lease was transferred to Reba and Muriel Schwartz in March 1960. The new owners were experienced motion picture operators … Local papers reported they were putting the Elk in first-class condition for the spring opening. The drive-in closed in the early 1980s, and in 1984 the property was sold.
Its Facebook page says it failed to open for the 2014 season. On April 7, 2014, they wrote, “We are sorry to say the Way-Bak-Wyn Drive-In will not be open in the summer of 2014. We will miss our wonderful customers. Thanks for all your support during our short run. The age of digital has come and we just can’t afford to upgrade our equipment.”
Google Earth shows the site overgrown with trees, but the screen and sign are both in there. Here’s a picture from March 2018: https://www.flickr.com/photos/29276830@N02/27505498688/
The Baytown Sun had a column about the Decker this week. It’s behind a (cough) paywall (cough, view page source).
Anyway, the opening date was given as March 29, 1949. The Decker covered 10 acres and had room for 575 cars, plus 50 seats near the 50-foot-wide screen. The second screen was added in “the mid 70’s”.
For more info, you might contact the column’s author, Russell Hamman, at his Facebook group Baytown History with a Twist.
Thanks for the note, NealJ.
As of a July 26 Facebook post, “The drive in is still up for grabs! Have had so many wonderful people interested, however for many different reasons it has fallen through.”
An article which mentioned that the nearby Star-Lite added a second screen in 1979 said in passing that the East Park closed in 1978.
Sioux Falls historian Eric Renshaw wrote an extensive history of the “Star-Lite Drive-in” for the Sept. 14, 2018 Argus Leader. If that link is alive when you read this, you should check it out.
Otherwise, here are a few summary details from that article:
John Nathan Sawaya passed away on October 19 1987, at age 63. The Peak was still listed in the International Motion Picture Almanac’s final drive-in survey in early 1988. Based on Anthony L. Vazquez-Hernandez’s photo comment, that’s probably when the Peak closed permanently.
The Starlite was down to a single active screen by the time I (Carload.com) started running its movie listings in the late 1990s. It was definitely still alive in 2012, but had closed by 2015.