Please Buy My New Book

About a year ago, I had an idea that clicked so hard in my head that I couldn’t shake it out. It was for a book I wanted to read, an intersection between two nostalgic niches – Route 66 and drive-in theaters. Since nobody else had published the book I wanted, I was stuck with the task of writing it.

For the past six months, I’ve been working on gathering all the details and images I can legally plop into my book, and now it’s ready for you to read. Drive-Ins of Route 66 is available on Amazon as a Kindle book, a full-color paperback, and a less expensive black and white paperback. The Kindle version is also included for Kindle Unlimited members. (And of course, if you click through the links in this post, I get a small affiliate percentage in addition to any royalties I’d earn.)

This book is chock full of quirky turns of phrase, old and new illustrations, and the stories behind each of the 105 drive-in theaters that ever existed within about two miles of Route 66, or one of its alternates, while it was active. Some tell of fights with the censors, some tell of fights with each other, and at least one drive-in is described for the first time in print in over half a century. I’ll be adding some excerpts (such as the chapter called A Short History of Drive-Ins) here on Carload in the weeks to come so you can get a taste.

This book is meant to be periodically updated with new information. So if you spot a mistake or know something interesting to add, let me know so I can include it in the next edition. With ebooks, that next edition could be out next week.

If you’re okay with reading books on a device or your computer (however you’re reading this now), I’d recommend the Kindle version, which lets you see some very nice color photos at a fraction of the cost of the full-color paperback. (It turns out that printing dozens of book pages with all of those inks gets expensive.) You know you want to read this, so go buy it!

Video: Rodeo Celebrates 70 Years

Over the years, I’ve seen a lot of local TV news segments about nearby drive-in theaters. This week, KING-TV, Seattle’s News Leader, posted an affectionate look at Bremerton WA’s Rodeo Drive-In Theatre that has to be in my Top Ten.

As I wrote two years ago during my Drive-In-A-Day Odyssey, “Rodeo Motor Movies” opened in 1949 as a single-screen drive-in for about 600 cars. The Seattle-based Cascade/Seven Gables Cinemas bought the Rodeo in 1977 and added two more screens the following year, expanding the capacity total to about 1000 cars.

Jack and Cindy Ondracek bought the rundown Rodeo in 1986 after it had been for sale for several years, and they still own it today. “It was a big leap of faith at the time but it worked out real well,” said Jack, who is now the projectionist. Cindy runs the box office, and oldest daughter Cheryl manages the snack bar.

KING’s video, which I can’t recommend highly enough, shows plenty of patrons relaxing and getting happy waiting for the movie to start. Its story ends with a perfect quote from Cindy: “People up here value the fact that the evening is sometimes the most amazing part of the entire day. Out here we kind of embrace that, and we give you a great way to finish the day off.”

There are photos and more details in KING’s post online. For a good time, you really should go read it!

Greenwood’s 25 Beats Duke Energy

Just after the Charleston SC Post and Courier wrote about the drive-ins of South Carolina, the Greenwood SC Index-Journal reported a financial victory for one of those three, the Auto 25 Drive In there in Greenwood.

The 25 Auto Drive-In in Greenwood SC.
2014 photo by herdintheupstate, via CinemaTreasures.

That drive-in opened in 1945, and its electricity provider used to be the Greenwood County Electric Power Commission. In 1966, South Carolina lawmakers allowed Duke Power to buy that provider, but with the condition that its then-existing customers would have their electric rates locked in forever.

Fast-forward to 2009. When Tommy and Carolyn McCutcheon purchased and reopened the 25, it still enjoyed that same old wonderfully low rate on its electric bill. In the spring of 2015, some power outages led to Duke Energy (Duke Power’s successor) insisting on a service upgrade that would negate that old price break. The McCutcheons hired an electrician who said that Duke’s neglect of its equipment was responsible for the problems.

It’s a long story with a fair amount of drama, but I’ll jump to the spoiler for you. In 2017, state regulators ruled that Duke had acted improperly and restored the old rate. Duke appealed that decision to the courts, repeatedly, losing every time. (Utility companies, amiright?) Finally last week, the South Carolina Supreme Court reaffirmed all of the lower courts’ rulings, and Duke announced it would stop fighting this particular case.

“I spent a lot of money fighting them,” Tommy McCutcheon said. “More than I’ll ever recoup, probably.” But he told the Index-Journal that he was glad to be able to turn his attention back to running the drive-in. For many more details on this battle with a happy ending, you really should go read it!