My uncle owned this theater and I worked the small concession area in the lobby. He also owned the Sauk Trail Drive In Theater in South Chicago Heights. The Steger Theater was only open on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. It catered mostly to the children and families of Steger. I have fond memories.
My uncle owned this drive in and I spent all of my youth there from as early as I can remember until 1977, which was the last year it was open. I have a lot of fond memories of growing up here, I even learned how to drive a car there when I was about 7 or 8. Dave you are correct my uncle gave out season passes that would adhere to the windshield. Learned how to drive a tractor and run the large movie projectors. An interesting tidbit that many may not know is that the movies came on approximately 8 different reals and you had to make the switch at the exact time from one projector to another. The interesting part is to know when to flip the switch which would turn off one and turn on the other, all films back in the day would have round circles pop up on the screen in the upper right for just a couple seconds, this meant to get ready, then there would be another set of circles displayed in the upper right portion of the screen, this is when you would flip the switch so to the viewer it looked seemless. The next time you watch an older movie (prior to 1977 at least), look for the circles to pop up in the upper right hand side, its only for brief seconds so most people never see them, but all the movies have them.
Budlytman, my uncle’s name was William “Fain” Bales. Everyone called him by his middle name, Fain.
My uncle owned this theater and I worked the small concession area in the lobby. He also owned the Sauk Trail Drive In Theater in South Chicago Heights. The Steger Theater was only open on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. It catered mostly to the children and families of Steger. I have fond memories.
My uncle owned this drive in and I spent all of my youth there from as early as I can remember until 1977, which was the last year it was open. I have a lot of fond memories of growing up here, I even learned how to drive a car there when I was about 7 or 8. Dave you are correct my uncle gave out season passes that would adhere to the windshield. Learned how to drive a tractor and run the large movie projectors. An interesting tidbit that many may not know is that the movies came on approximately 8 different reals and you had to make the switch at the exact time from one projector to another. The interesting part is to know when to flip the switch which would turn off one and turn on the other, all films back in the day would have round circles pop up on the screen in the upper right for just a couple seconds, this meant to get ready, then there would be another set of circles displayed in the upper right portion of the screen, this is when you would flip the switch so to the viewer it looked seemless. The next time you watch an older movie (prior to 1977 at least), look for the circles to pop up in the upper right hand side, its only for brief seconds so most people never see them, but all the movies have them.