Carefree Drive-In
251 Hannah Drive,
Oliver Springs,
TN
37840
251 Hannah Drive,
Oliver Springs,
TN
37840
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The Carefree Drive-In was opened on May 19, 1954 with Richard Conte in “Highway Dragnet”. I don’t know a lot about the Carefree Drive In, but I do remember driving by it in the mid-1970’s. I never actually saw a movie there. If I remember correctly, the entrance of the drive-in was at the dead end of a side street on the left side of Highway 62 if you were driving from Oak Ridge and/or towards Coalfield. It was closed on June 23, 1974.
Contributed by
Bob Brown
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Recent comments (view all 12 comments)
Thanks Mike!!!!
Only in Tennessee.Sorry Tlsloews.
No Problem Mike.
TLSLOEWS.Does that make sense what Chuck1231 wrote. i know its fact Highway 61 and 62 are the same highway.
Like you said only in Tennessee.
I lived in East Tennessee, in and around Knoxville, from 1972 until 1978. One of the great things about the KNOXVILLE NEWS SENTINEL at the time was that in Friday’s paper, in addition to ads for the Knoxville theaters and drive-ins, they also had a feature called “showing at area drive-ins” where you could find out what was showing at drive-ins in the surrounding small towns. There were so many of them then. I would have never believed at the time that virtually all of them would have disappeared so fast!
Bbrown, I had relatives in East Tenn. and somehow managed to save a few SENTINELS,that is where i am getting my movies. I think most towns the size of Knoxville had in friday’s paper what was showing and what was coming next week. My paper here in Augusta had the same thing,and yes i saved a few of them.
Approx. location for this drive-in was Hannah and Carl south of HWYS 61/62.
The first ad I could find for the Carefree was on May 19, 1954, when it was “Now Open.” The show that night was “Highway Dragnet” plus two color cartoons.
The last ad I could easily find for the Carefree was on June 23, 1974. An unrelated story in the March 15, 1981 Knoxville News-Sentinel said that 48-year-old Edwin L. Kelley owned the “old Carefree Drive-In,” where he was storing some of his stuff.
A 1981 aerial photo showed the remains of a drive-in about a mile south of the old Oliver Springs city limits west of the highway just north of what was then Norwood. (It was also marked in topo maps from 1972 through 2001.) A UPS Customer Center occupies the site today, now within the expanded Oliver Springs, at 251 Hannah Dr, Oliver Springs, TN 37840.
On Aug. 24, 1974, the Knoxville News-Sentinel ran an obituary for Louise Duncan, who “was owner and operator of the Carefree Drive-In, Oliver Springs and the Clinton Drive-In, Clinton, both of which ceased operation in the mid 1970s”.