A couple of weekends ago, I drove past an old drive-in theater south of Kansas City that had been closed for some time. The screen was torn down. The grass in the field was quite high. And all that really remained was the old concession stand, which was a cylinder shaped building with peeling paint. I wish I would have stopped to take a photo of it because it really brought back a lot of memories.
I miss drive-in theaters. I miss getting there early with a carload of friends to stake out the best available parking spot. I miss rolling down the window and then rolling it back up again to secure the speaker inside the car. I miss walking through row after row of cars to get to the concession stand. I miss the opportunity to laugh as loud as you want to, and as often as you want to, without being concerned about bothering somebody else. I miss seeing children playing on the playground below the screen. I miss the double and triple features that drive-ins used to offer. I miss getting home at 2:00 or 3:00 AM after the double and triple features were finally over.
The last drive-in theater in the metro area in which I live closed in 2007. I wish I had taken better advantage of it before it did close. The last movie I remember seeing at a drive-in was Purple Rain, which, if my memory is correct, came out in 1984—the year I graduated from high school.
I did a little searching and found this website that says there are 494 drive-ins that are currently open in the United States. At one time there was 4,000 to 5,000 in operation. The same website says that there are only two drive-ins remaining in Nebraska—neither of which are anywhere near where I live. It sounds sort of crazy, but I wouldn’t mind going to visit one anyway, making a weekend out of it. And it would be even more fun if they were showing showing three classic movies in a row from the 80s.
