Thu 14 Jun 2012
by Walker Martin
While recently engaged in one of my favorite activities, mainly that of watching movies on DVD, I suddenly realized that it was the birthday of one of my former hangouts, the Drive-In Theater.
On June 6, 1933, the Drive-In was born in Camden, New Jersey. It immediately became the place to go and by the height of its popularity in the 1950’s and 1960’s there were over 4,000 theaters across the country.
In the 1970’s, my wife and I went to the Drive-Ins just about every weekend. Even in the winter, the places were so popular that there were theaters that provided in-car heaters. Of course you would have to turn your ignition and also use the car heater.
There were several in the Trenton NJ area and we used to visit them all: US 1 North Drive-In, Roosevelt Drive-In, Lawrence, Route 206, The Dix, Ewing Drive-In. Too many to remember.
They are all gone now, and maybe for me personally it’s a good thing. I probably would not have survived to 2012 if I had continued to go to them. I believe most of them died in the 1980’s and if they had lasted much longer, I would have died with them.
Why? I got into the habit of following my “Drive-In Routine,” which consisted of cigarettes, a six pack of beer, and Arby roast beef sandwiches and french fries.
We would eagerly arrive while it was still daylight in order to get a place in the front or second row. I would hold off the orgy of eating and drinking until the opening credits and then it was not a pretty sight as I devoured Arby’s and swilled cans of beer, tossing them outside the car window as I finished each one. One beer equaled one cigarette.
My wife hated my smoking because the smell of old cigarette smoke would sink into her hair and clothes. But, being the typically guy, and since she was a non-book collector, what did I care? Even at the Drive-In, I still applied my life long philosophy that there are two types of people, collectors and non-collectors.
There was another annoying thing about many Drive-Ins: the bugs and insects. In the hot summer nights we would of course have the windows down and in they would come to feast on me. They mainly ignored my wife because she was only half my size, and the Arby’s and beers must have made my blood taste good.
To try and drive the bugs away, many of the theaters sold a product called PIC. I forget what the initials meant but it was a coil that you lit with a match and placed on your dashboard. It seemed to work on clearing the bugs out of the car but after awhile you also wanted to leave the car.
Of course, after a few beers I no longer cared about them and I had no trouble concentrating on the movie.
My wife and I followed the same routine. Me with Arby’s, french fries, beer, cigarettes, while watching all 3 movies, and she gasping, coughing, scratching, and complaining while she watched the first feature. She never made it past the first movie because she always fell asleep during the first intermission.
It seemed I always picked the movie, and they just about all were the triple feature horror movies. This was before the VCR and the video revolution, and you could not find many of the movies on TV.
Some were foreign imports showing more than the usual violence and skin but my favorites were the Hammer horror films. Nothing like a Hammer horror movie combined with Arby’s and beer. Heaven!
Actually my first experiences with a Drive-In came late in life but once exposed, I was hooked until they all died. I’ve always had my nose stuck in a book during my childhood and into my twenties. It was not until I was drafted into Army that I started regularly attending. While at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, a bunch of soldiers would pile into a car with a couple cases of beer and go to the Drive-Ins off base.
The first time I went I was not used to drinking and instead of drinking beer I drank a bottle of blackberry brandy. The last thing I remembered was the opening credits of the first feature. The next thing I recalled was the closing credits of the third and last movie. I had passed out and missed all three films. I made sure that never happened again.
There used to be hundreds of the theaters in New Jersey and now there is one in Vineland NJ that I’m aware of. Too far away. What killed the Drive-In? The VCR and the video revolution killed them.
No longer did movie lovers and horror buffs have to go to the Drive-In to see films of the bizarre and unusual. Instead they could stay home and watch the movies on their VCR’s in the comfort of family surroundings.
No more fighting insects, smelly PICS, or terrible drive-in rest rooms. I never tried drive-in fast food but it looked deadly.
So Happy Birthday to the Drive-In. I know there are a few scattered survivors in other parts of the country. But in New Jersey, the birthplace of the Drive-In, they are sadly missed. Rest In Peace.
June 14th, 2012 at 2:33 pm
Thanks for the memories!
June 14th, 2012 at 3:04 pm
The Drive-In never really took of in Great Britain, and you don’t really need to look far for the reason: the weather. In recent years there has been a trend of movie showings in the grounds of country houses and the like (I’ve heard of a showing of NIGHT OF THE DEMON in the gardens of the country house that features in the movie), but not the Drive-In.
As a kid, I used to go to the local movie theatre on Saturday morning for the Children’s Film Show. Assuming that it wasn’t something too boring, I went to see the show. But the rest of the kids were there to find somewhere to smoke out of view of their parents (as soon as the lights went out, the whole place flared into light as dozens of matches were struck, followed by the steady orange glow of loads of cigarettes). If they got tired of what was on show, the kids would send out scouting parties to turn on the house lights. I can still recall the apoplectic manager, looking for all the world like Basil Fawlty, coming out into the auditorium and threatening all of us with ejection if we carried on farting about.
My abiding memory is not of the films, but of regularly experiencing the effect of a sugar overdose (the world starts to look very strange when you’ve consumed a packet of Maltesers, two Mars Bars, a tub of ice cream, a can of Coke, a Curly-Wurly and a Crunchie in the space of an hour).
We still have a cinema, but it’s a multiplex with no ambience and no soul. The Odeon where I saw so many films as a kid is no more. It’s boarded up now, but I do wonder whether, in the dead of night, the ghostly sound of the manager’s voice can still be heard screaming at the kids…
June 14th, 2012 at 3:26 pm
Walker, you should have left your wife at home, if she didn’t enjoy it.
And, anyway, what keeps you from enjoying beer, cigarettes and roast beef at home, now that the Drive-Ins are OD ?
The Doc
June 14th, 2012 at 3:31 pm
@Bradstreet –
I remember smoking on the London Underground, with wooden slate floors.
A gentleman in a Savile Row suit tried to light a cigarette with a Ronson, the type that looked like a jet plane.
A jet of a flame emerged, just like it did out of the one I owned.
I quipped “They’re vicious, aren’t they” and offered him my BIC.
The Doc
June 14th, 2012 at 5:08 pm
Loved the drive-in. I was a very young boy the first time our family went to one as a group. My parents had us get in our pajamas, put blankets and pillows in the back of our station wagon, and off we went. They were sure my two brothers and I would fall asleep at some point during the night. But I remember watching at least the titles and first half of the movie. It was Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines. The info at imdb.com tells me I was all of four years old when it first came out and yet I definitely remember seeing this in a drive-in. Other movies I remember seeing at drive-ins at various stages in my life: Fantastic Voyage with Stephen Boyd, Donald Pleasance and Raquel Welch, It! with Roddy McDowall, and the original The Pink Panther with the fabulous Peter Sellers.
June 14th, 2012 at 5:20 pm
Dan: Memories are sometimes very complex things. This just came out of nowhere while I was watching a dvd in a very small room. I started thinking about the good old days at the Drive In, in the out of doors and how I missed the entire experience. Within an hour I had typed the online article and sent it to Steve. I figured I also saw alot of mysteries at the Drive In, so it has a Mystery File connection.
Bradstreet: I bet the Drive In is mainly a USA invention.
June 14th, 2012 at 5:26 pm
Doc: You got me thinking about why I loved Arby’s, cigarettes, and beer so much at the Drive In but now I don’t the same desires. I guess I was just younger and didn’t think about the impact of smoking and eating roast beef sandwiches twice a week.
Now I eat Arby’s a couple times a year and I stopped smoking decades ago. I still drink beer, especially imported European brands. Probably the influence of all the Nero Wolfe novels that I read!
June 14th, 2012 at 5:41 pm
I think everybody in US who’s over a certain age has a ton of memories about drive-ins, family outings, certain girl friends (or even wives) they went with and the terrible movies they saw, and even (perhaps) the stunts they pulled with their buddies, before, during and after.
But mum’s the word on that. Legally, that was quite a while ago, and the statute of limitations may have run out, but I have a feeling that maybe, just maybe, it hasn’t.
June 14th, 2012 at 5:52 pm
I see J.F. Norris has some family memories of the drive-in with mainstream films, etc. My view of the whole experience was sort of like forbidden pleasures. It was like a party or picnic atmosphere after the week’s work was over. As a result, I tended to always want to see the horror triple features or the sexy foreign films promising more than they could ever deliver.
Steve mentions the terrible movies at the drive-in and he is certainly right about that! That’s one of the reasons I bought along the beer because some of the films could drive you to drink. I still remember the double bill of THE CORPSE GRINDERS and I DRINK YOUR BLOOD, I EAT YOUR SKIN.
I spent half the time groaning in disbelief and the other half laughing in disbelief. But I still found it a fun experience, especially in the summer nights.
June 15th, 2012 at 8:46 am
Walker’s “drive-in routine” has become the bane of my existence — well, okay, maybe that’s an overstatement. But his fixation with Arby’s manifests itself every time we drive together to a convention like PulpFest or Windy City. When we’re on the road and lunchtime approaches, Walker insists we find and patronize one of the wretched slopholes. Any sane person knows that Wendy’s is by far the more palatable alternative.
June 15th, 2012 at 8:54 am
Walker’s mention of THE CORPSE GRINDERS reminds me of a memorable drive-in experience, circa 1969. That Ted V. Mikels classic was part of a triple bill which also included THE EMBALMER and THE UNDERTAKER AND HIS PALS. The latter, as much a black comedy as a horror film, shows one of its heavies performing an impromptu operation on a buxom blonde strapped to his table. It looked pretty goofy until the editor cut — there’s no other word — to close-up footage of an actual abdominal surgery, probably something shot for medical-school use.
That was pretty graphic stuff in those pre-CSI days, and my buddies and I had been consuming large quantities of beer and greasy popcorn. One of my more squeamish pals flung open the car door and by my estimate he, er, unburdened himself of about five bucks worth.
June 15th, 2012 at 8:56 am
Yes, Ed and I have gotten into arguments about which is better, Arby’s or Wendy’s. Fortunately our pal, Digges La Touche is also along for the ride and he votes with me for Arby’s. However, at the last pulp show there were 5 of us in the van: 3 voted for Wendy’s and 2 voted for Arby’s.
A major defeat for the Arby lovers.
June 15th, 2012 at 9:02 am
I also remember THE EMBALMER and THE UNDERTAKER AND HIS PALS. These were the type of films that made me a drive-in regular. True, they were often terrible, or as Ed mentions, disgusting, but nowhere else could you see the bizarre and the unusual.
TV would not show them and this was before the VCR made its appearance, so the drive-in was the place to go if you wanted to see horror in all its sleazy glory.
June 15th, 2012 at 1:37 pm
Try THE MOVIEGOER by Walker Percy
June 15th, 2012 at 3:31 pm
I’ve read THE MOVIEGOER by Walker Percy a couple times and I certainly can identify with the protagonist. My entire life has centered around reading books, pulps, vintage paperbacks, and watching old movies.
I can still remember setting my goals in life when I was discharged from the army. My goals were to watch great films and read each day, not to mention my collecting activities like getting complete sets of WEIRD TALES, BLACK MASK, ADVENTURE, etc.
I had very little interest in my working career which I saw as simply a means to pay the bills and raise a family. Not to mention buy enough books, magazines, and dvds to fill an entire house…
Once again, Dan’s blunt statement “Try THE MOVIEGOER by Walker Percy”, proves just how interesting the comments on MYSTERY FILE can be. I recommend this great American novel to all movie buffs and readers, especially the ones that feel “real life” is not the workaday world but the life of the mind as stimulated by great films and books.
June 15th, 2012 at 10:02 pm
I grew up a quarter of a mile away from our town’s drive-in, so my friends and I walked there quite a bit, especially during the summer. Now, of course, no sane person would dream of sending a gang of 10-year-old boys off by themselves that way, but it really was a different time then. Most of the movies I remember watching were Westerns, but there were also beach movies, war movies, and James Bond. Good times.
The rest of the story is that when I was in high school, new owners took over the drive-in and turned it into a X-rated theater. Someone burned it down, but they rebuilt it and continued showing porn for another ten years or so.
June 15th, 2012 at 10:31 pm
James Reasoner’s comment reminds me of such admission specials as “dollar a carload night”. Some cars would arrive with an amazing number of people stuffed inside. Then when each person had to pay for a ticket, some moviegoers hid in the trunk of the car to avoid paying. A big car could hold several people in the trunk, usually college kids who were already under the influence.
I always brought my own food and drink but I’ve seen the drive-in menu at the concession stands and it was deadly. Usually just frozen hot dogs and hamburgers which my friends told me tasted like cardboard and stale popcorn. The candy sometimes was so old that it was unedible. I used to wonder why on earth would you not bring your own food?
June 16th, 2012 at 8:06 am
James is so right about the changing times. Our local drive-in was bordered on the front end by a highway (the screen faced inwards so that passing drivers couldn’t see the picture) and on the back end by a stretch of forest that was perhaps a quarter mile thick. On the other side of the forest was a typical suburban housing development.
When I was 12 or 13 — old enough to stay out past dark as long as my parents knew where I was — my pals and I would ride our bikes (after supper, at twilight) to the house of a friend who lived in that housing development. Our folks all thought we were watching TV, or playing ping-pong, or swapping comic books on Friday or Saturday nights when we were actually sneaking into the drive-in from the rear to watch “Adults Only” movies (this was before the MPAA ratings, of course). At that time it was already a local tradition of several years’ standing; even then the trail through the woods was well worn and easily followed in the dark.
Of course, I didn’t know a damn thing about those movies; they represented forbidden fruit and therefore were considered worth our effort. It took me many years to find out that we were watching stuff by exploitation filmmakers who today enjoy “cult” status: Russ Meyer, Joe Sarno, Herschell Gordon Lewis, et cetera.
Initially my friends and I huddled at the edge of the woods, in the back row of the lot, but after a year or two — by this time I would have been 14 or 15 — we became sufficiently brazen to congregate around the concession stand. None of the employees (who, after all, were only a few years older than us) gave a damn, although the manager caught us every now and then.
Sneaking into movies is a rite of passage for adolescent boys. What would give today’s parents the heebie-jeebies is the idea that we were traipsing through a quarter mile of dense forest — in the dark — to get there….
June 21st, 2012 at 6:16 pm
My memories gravitate to the drive-in in Grand Island, Nebraska, where I went with my parents many times in the 1950s. Standard Hollywood fare most nights. Second-run, third-run features. The screen faced west, and the movies started at dusk, so the first half of the first film was usually too dim on to see.
In the 1960s, there was a drive-in in Los Angeles where my wife and I saw HELP! from the back row.
In the 1970s, my family would occasionally go to a drive-in near where we lived in northern Pennsylvania. There were cows in a nearby pasture, and some nights the fog would roll in and obscure the screen. Saw AMERICAN GRAFFITI there with visiting friends from Manchester, England. That may have been the last time.
Thanks, Walker, for the memories.
June 21st, 2012 at 10:32 pm
Thanks for your comments Ron. Once again I’m reminded of just how widespread the drive-ins once were. You went to them in Nebraska, Los Angeles and Pennsylvania. I saw them in New Jersey and Missouri. They were all over, in every state of the Union.
Now, except for a mere handful, they are gone. Nostalgia is a funny thing. I never thought at the time, decades ago, that I would miss the insects, the horrible smelling PICS, the fast food, the intermissions with the annoying clock counting down the minutes.
But I do miss them, especially the outdoor experience of a nice summer night in cool air, watching a movie. Somehow sitting in my living room, watching a dvd on my widescreen TV is a poor substitute.
June 22nd, 2012 at 2:10 am
My wife and I moved to Connecticut from Michigan in 1969. We used to go to the drive-in all the time when we lived in Ann Arbor, but no more than a handful of time after we moved. I do remember once going to a drive-in here alone, simply because it was a movie I wanted to see at the time, PLAY MISTY FOR ME, which came out in 1971. I think George C. Scott was in the other one, and the title may come back to me tomorrow. It’s three in the morning now, and way past my bedtime.
Going to the drive-in was fun, but I didn’t seem to miss them all that much as they started to die out. Our lives changed, and the bugs, the uncomfortable seats, the tinny sound through the speakers, and everything else became more of nuisance than a pleasure. The number of comments on this post shows just how fondly drive-in’s are remembered. It’s clear that it will be a good long while yet before drive-in’s are forgotten. But they will, sure as shooting, just as much as those contraptions you could use to see scenes on specially made cards in 3D, whatever they were called. (Not Viewmasters. They came along a long time later.)
So I don’t know. While I can miss the past as much as anyone, I guess I really don’t mind watching DVDs on my huge screen TV in my living room.
June 22nd, 2012 at 7:29 am
Ok, I guess it all boils down to one sad fact. Yes, it is nice to watch dvds on the big screen TV in my living room. But I’m 70 years old without much of a future. I’m not complaining; that’s just a simple fact.
Back in the 1960’s and 1970’s, I was alot younger, with a future, and watching movies at the drive-in. If satan showed up with a contract to sign in blood, I think I know which I’d choose: watching dvds at age 70 or the drive-in at age 30.
I think nostalgia is simply remembering a younger time, maybe not a better time but when you were younger.
June 22nd, 2012 at 4:34 pm
“I think nostalgia is simply remembering a younger time, maybe not a better time but when you were younger.”
Nicely said, Walker. Nicely said.