Oceanside Drive-In
1823 Mission Avenue,
Oceanside,
CA
92058
1823 Mission Avenue,
Oceanside,
CA
92058
3 people
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Additional Info
Previous Names: Midway Drive-In
Nearby Theaters
The Midway Drive-In was opened by December 16, 1948 with Susan Haywood in “Smash-Up: The Story of a Woman”. It was later renamed Oceanside Drive-In and was closed on April 2, 1974 with Yung Henry Yu in “From China with Death” & Barbara Jefford in “Lust for a Vampire”.
Contributed by
RobertR
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Recent comments (view all 13 comments)
There is a drive-in at 3480 Mission Ave. that is now a swap meet. It looks like it has 3 screens, website is oceansideswapmeet.com. I will try and find out more info next month when I’m down there on vacation.
That’s the Valley-Drive In at 340 Mission Ave.
Thanks Scott, I guess I didn’t look thru all the DI’s in Oceanside. At least I’ll be able to shoot some new pics of the interior to share.
The aerial photo on this listing is of the Vista Drive-In, and should be removed. I’m fairly certain this entire listing should be removed.
The three drive-ins in the vicinity of Oceanside were named the Midway Drive-In, the Valley Drive-In, and the Vista Drive-In.
The aerial shot shown is better addressed as 2095 W Vista Way, Vista, CA and just across the line from Oceanside
Aerial photos show the 1823 Mission Avenue drive-in by 1953, then redeveloped between 1978 and 1980.
And this ad from 1948 shows that back then, it was advertising as the Mission Drive-In.
It May Have Opened As Early As December 16, 1948. A Few Ads Survive A Few Days Earlier Than That.
I believe we have misnamed this drive-in. It ended its life as the Oceanside.
The 1968 Los Angeles Film Exchange directory included the Oceanside Drive-In, address 1823 Mission. It was run by Sero Amusement. (In the 1963 LA directory, it was listed as the Midway at the same address.) Its final entry in the Motion Picture Almanac’s annual drive-in list was Oceanside.
Oceanside’s North County Times ran a drive-in retrospective article on April 14, 2002. In it, one of the Siegel brothers said they operated but didn’t own the Midway on Mission Avenue. “The family ran that drive-in in the 1960s until the owner closed it and sold the land.”
In fact, I can’t find any evidence that the Midway/Oceanside was ever called the Vista, which was the name of a drive-in in Vista CA (less than 10 miles away) that also advertised in North County Times. LebowskiT1000 had the right address for that one, and it wasn’t Mission.
The Oceanside’s final advertisement was on Tuesday, April 2, 1974, showing “From China With Death” and “Lust For a Vampire”. It was gone from the Siegels' ads the next day. In October that year, First Baptist Youth staged a haunted house in “the snack bar building at the old Oceanside Drive-In”.
Opened with “Smash Up” supported by two cartoons on December 16, 1948