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Uploaded on: October 28, 2026

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Radium Hill Drive-in, centre left. Photo from June Kakoschke, SA State Library and Looking Back Publications.

The Radium Hill Drive-In Cinema (often referred to as an open-air picture theatre) was established in the remote South Australian uranium mining town of Radium Hill in the early 1950s.

• The open-air cinema began screening films around June 1951 (with operations noted into 1952 and throughout the town’s active mining boom) to entertain mine workers and their families.

• It is widely recognized as South Australia’s first drive-in theatre, predating the suburban drive-in craze that swept Australia later in the 1950s.

• Unlike modern drive-ins where sitting inside a vehicle was strictly required, the Radium Hill venue functioned as an open-air picture space where a car wasn’t always compulsory. It projected 16mm films outdoors for the isolated community.

• The theatre was part of a remarkably self-contained outback company town that—at its peak in the late 1950s—housed over 1,000 residents and featured a swimming pool, wet canteen, library, milk bar, and sports clubs.

• The uranium mine exhausted its ore bodies and officially closed in December 1962, leading to the rapid dismantling and abandonment of the town.

Contributed by Greg Lynch -