The Drive-In

Entertainment in the 1960s may have been unsophisticated by today's standards, but it was lots of fun. The one thing it wasn't was a constant companion. We didn't have hundreds of channels all running 24/7. We couldn't watch DVDs at home or movies on demand on our computer screens or cell phones. We only had AM radio stations and the three major networks on TV, which switched off every night at midnight. And going to the movies was a real treat. But you can't miss what you've never had, and we were all quite happy with our choices.

My first memories of the radio actually are from my grandparent's house. Every morning my Pop used to get up really early and sit in the kitchen listening to the Farm Report. Mommaw would be up, too, fixing him breakfast. My cousins and I often spent the night there, and in those early morning hours we would lie half-awake, half-asleep in our bed, listening to Dewey Compton's easy southern drawl faithfully reciting the prices for corn and soybeans or the current market value for cattle and hogs, all underlaid by the comforting smell of hot biscuits and fried bacon. I never understood a word of what he was saying, but it didn't matter. If Dewey Compton and the Farm Report were on in the morning, then all was right with the world.

As I've already discussed, there wasn't a lot of daytime programming suitable for kids, but we used to watch TV in the evening. For some reason, I most remember watching TV at Mommaw’s house on Sunday nights. I guess we must have had Sunday dinner there often. We might watch the Lawrence Welk Show or Dr. Kildaire. But without fail, we always watched the Ed Sullivan Show. I remember seeing the Beatles on TV for the first time. Everyone kept exclaiming over how long their hair was! It was very exciting, mainly because it upset all the grownups so much. It was the first time I became aware of “the generation gap.”

As we grew older, we were sometimes allowed to stay up later and watch The Late Show on weekend nights. After the 10 o'clock news, the TV stations would air old black & white movies from the 40s and 50s, filled with enough commercial breaks to take them up to sign-off time at midnight. Or we might stay up late to watch Rod Sterling's The Twilight Zone, which were very creepy and scary stories for the time. It was fun to huddle together under a blanket and be scared en masse, then trundle off to bed and hope we didn't have nightmares.

We usually got to go to the movies on Saturday afternoons, if there was anything playing that was suitable for kids to watch. We spent a lot of time in the old Santa Rosa theatre. It had a real stage down front and tons of deep red velvet curtains with gilt tassels. It also had a balcony where the older kids sat, but our mothers never wanted to sit up there. I remember my mother took me there to see the first Beatles movie. I watched it again the other day, and it really wasn’t a very “kid” oriented movie. In fact, it wasn’t a very good movie at all. But that didn’t seem to matter. In the sixties, movie goers were a pretty easy-to-satisfy lot.

We went to see a lot of movies. If it was Saturday afternoon, it would often just be me and my mom. Sometimes, though, the cousins would come along, too, and we would take up a whole row. We would buy candy bars or popcorn and settle in for the afternoon. I saw all the Beatles movies, all the Elvis movies, all the Beach Party movies with Annette and Frankie, and all the kid flicks that came out. I remember seeing Haley Mills in Pollyanna, and I fell in love with Flipper! And I guess we saw every Disney comedy and animated movie there was as well.

It was different if we went to the movies at night. The dads came then. On Friday nights, our family often went to the local drive-in movie theatre. I really miss those old drive-ins. Our local one was called the “Hi Neighbor!” on Mykawa Rd. No kidding. That was its name. Oh, how I loved that old drive-in movie theatre.

I guess our family didn’t have much money in those days, but we could afford to go out to the movies on Friday nights. The drive-in might show 3 or 4 movies in a single night, all for a single admission price! My mom and dad would make a pallet for me in the back seat of our old Pontiac. When I got sleepy, I could just lie down and go to bed.

I remember those nights as being such good times! You have to remember that this was before daylight savings time was introduced. It got dark a lot earlier then. Daddy would get home from work around 4:00 p.m., and Mama would be in the kitchen frying chicken. She would pack us an entire picnic dinner--fried chicken, potato salad, hot biscuits--complete with iced tea in Mason jars and maybe even some slices of apple pie or chocolate cake.

We would arrive at the drive-in early enough to get a “good place” near the center. If you parked too close to the movie screen, you would get a crick in your neck trying to look up at the big screen. And too far off to either side, the picture would be distorted. We always tried to park right in the center, but not too close to the concession stand. If you were too close to the concession stand, you had to put up with people walking all around your car all night.

We would drive in and pull up to our spot. Daddy would park the car close enough to the speaker so that it would reach his window. You had to roll your window down at least half way and then hook this big metal box (speaker) onto the inside of your window. It was big and clumsy, and often full of static. Sometimes we would get a “bad” speaker and have to move the car after the movie started. That would always make Daddy very aggravated! We also tried to avoid cars with lots of small children and crying babies!

There was a grassy lot down at the very front of the big screen and the movie managers had put some old swing sets there for the kids. Daddy would usually walk with me down to the front so that I could play on the swings while we waited for it to get dark. I remember those twilight evenings so well, swinging and screaming and running around with dozens of other children, so happy to be out in the world and free. The fireflies would twinkle on and off as darkness began to fall, and the mosquitoes would begin to bite, and you would know it was almost time for the movie to start.

As soon as it was dark enough, the lights from the movie projector house would start to flicker and the first thing to come on was always a cartoon! Sometimes it would be Woody Woodpecker, and sometimes it would be Heckle and Jeckle. Or maybe Mr. Magoo. Oh, how we loved those old cartoons. We all watched them together and laughed at their antics as they flickered across the big screen.

Then the advertisements for the concession stand would start. They sold hot dogs and hamburgers and French fries and popcorn, and something else that always sounded so exotic: pizza! Do you know that the first place I ever heard of pizza was in those old advertisements at the drive-in? It always looked so good, but Daddy would never buy us any! He might go get us a popcorn and Coke later on in the evening, but we never ate any of the other concession stand goodies. As we settled in to watch the first feature, we would eat the picnic dinner that Mama had fixed for us. And oh, was it so good!

There was usually a family type picture on for the first movie, and then the more “adult” themed movies would come on later. I must have seen hundreds of westerns at the drive-in. Even today, sometimes an old John Wayne or Jimmy Stewart movie will come on, and I’ll have a flash back to the old “Hi Neighbor” theatre. It’s one of my fondest childhood memories.

I guess the last time I ever went to a drive-in movie theatre, I was in high school. They were almost all gone by then, replaced by the multiple screen movie theaters at the malls. I went to see Gone with The Wind with a couple of my girlfriends. It was in November and we nearly froze to death, but it was such fun. I sometimes wonder why the old drive-in theatres don't make a come-back, but I guess, like the dinosaurs, their time has come and gone. All I know is that there will never be a big screen TV in my living room that will be able to duplicate the same bigger-than-life feeling of watching a favorite movie at an outdoor drive-in theatre.