Author Archives: mrdrivein

Nov. 29: Skyview Drive-In, Carmichaels PA

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It’s Day 333 of my virtual Drive-In-a-Day Odyssey. Having finished my sweep of the drive-ins of the southern US, it was time to return to Pennsylvania to start the final survey of mostly closed-for-the-season theaters. It took over 5½ hours to drive from the Twin City Drive-in in Bristol TN through the full height of West Virginia to the Skyview Drive-In just a bit north of the border in Carmichaels PA.

The origins of the Skyview, and even its early spelling, aren’t perfectly clear. To start, every anecdotal reference I’ve found, including the drive-in’s official Facebook page, says that it opened in 1946. They’re all wrong – it was 1948. The 1948-49 Theatre Catalog listed the Carmichaels Drive-In as under construction at that point. A later newspaper clipping mentioned a lawsuit against the drive-in’s owners which alleged “when the theater was opened in 1948, reddog and earth was heaped up near the headwaters of a brook” and so forth.

Was it really called the Carmichaels? If so, not for long. The 1949-50 Catalog listed it as Carmichaels, and Pittsburgh radio station WESA‘s list said it was “Formerly The Carmichael’s Drive-In”. Yet its first advertisements in the newspapers of nearby Uniontown in summer 1950 were as the “Sky View”.

And then there’s the spelling issue. Its vintage sign shows it as the Sky View in all caps and a small gap between words, exactly like those first newspaper ads. By the 1960s, those ads were for the Sky-View, with a hyphen. Today its official Facebook page calls it the SkyView, one word, two capital letters. But the logo and the self-description on its web site has it Skyview, one word, one capital, so that’s how I use it.

From all accounts, Louis Stuler and Duard (or Durwood) Coe owned the drive-in from the time it opened. Stuler passed away from a heart attack at the age of 47 in 1961. Coe continued to own the Skyview for a while after that.

By 1978, the Cinemette Corporation of America had taken over the Skyview, and by 1984 it was owned by G & G Theaters, Inc. Then it all gets fuzzy for a while. The Southwest Pennsylvania Rural Exploration blog says that the Skyview’s “second screen and additions to the original screen (to facilitate wide-screen format) were added in 1986.”

Elizabeth Walker started working at the Skyview in 1999, and her husband Charles became manager in 2001. Together they bought the drive-in in 2007 and still own it today.

In 2011, the Walkers told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that they run the Skyview for the same reasons that patrons come. “The way I see it, you’re not going for the movie when you’re going to the drive-in,” Charles said. “You’re going for that fancy little word: nostalgia. It’s a piece of the past. It’s romantic.”

The Almanac of Pittsburgh wrote in August 2013 that the Walkers pooled their retirement savings and received money from two donors to buy used digital projectors. “We decided we would do everything we could to ensure it didn’t go down on our watch,” Charles said. This year, one of those projectors went bad, but they bought a replacement and kept on going.

The embedded YouTube video of the day has a dreamlike quality to it as shapes bend and wobble with the movement of the camera. I don’t know whether that’s intentional, but it’s kind of fun.

Miles Today / Total: 346 / 38614 (rounded to the nearest mile)

Movie Showing / Total Active Nights: dark / 199

Nearby Restaurant: The Hungarian Smokehouse in Carmichaels only offers its food to go, but it was worth stopping there to pick up dinner anyway. The special of the day was wings, cooked with a special smokehouse sauce. (I could have ordered Billy’s hell, but it sounded and smelled too frightening.) I added a side of baked beans and fries, and I was ready to bring my feast back to my hotel room for a relaxing dinner alone.

Where I Virtually Stayed: Surprisingly, Google doesn’t show any hotels very close to the Skyview, so I had to travel 11 miles west to Waynesville. There’s a Hampton Inn there, so that’s very good news. I had to drive through a shopping center parking lot to get there, but it had cookies and coffee waiting at check-in, a comfortable room with a king bed and all the modern amenities, and the great Hampton breakfast in the morning. When I drove back out past the Wendy’s, I wasn’t tempted to stop.

Only in Carmichaels: The Skyview is almost certainly the only drive-in theater across the street from a courthouse. Mind you, the building that holds the Magisterial District Judge of the Eastern District of Greene County looks more like a strip mall than a capitol. I’ll bet the judge’s decisions are just as binding as they’d be in a more ostentatious setting.

Next stop: Brownsville Drive-In, Grindstone PA.

Nov. 28: Twin City Drive-in, Bristol TN

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Twin City Drive-In marquee

Photo from the Twin City Drive-In Facebook page

It’s Day 332 of my virtual Drive-In-a-Day Odyssey. My drive was less than an hour and a half, heading down from the Central Drive-In Theatre, a few miles west of Norton VA, to the Twin City Drive-in just over the border in Bristol TN.

The Twin City was built in 1949 by Raymond Warden and Bo Diggs. In 1956, Diggs took it over, and in 1974 he sold it to his nephew Danny Warden. Danny and his wife Ellen Warden still own the place.

The Wardens have endured two crises. A tornado ripped off two-thirds of the original screen tower on Oct. 1, 1977, but the Wardens erected a replacement before the next weekend’s movies.

The second crisis arrived more slowly and I’m not exactly sure how it worked out. In August 2013, the Wardens were raising the alarm that they might have to sell the Twin City because of the need to switch to digital projection. “We’re going to show through this year, and unless something changes, that might be it,” Danny told the Johnson City Press. “You never know, though, we’ve had a couple of people who say they might be interested in buying it. If someone buys it and switches to digital, then it will stay open.”

Ellen had a slightly different perspective a couple of weeks later, quoted in the Bristol Herald Courier. “The digital conversion is something we can afford and we are blessed to be in that position because of the good business decision we have made over the years,” she said. “People have been buzzing around Facebook that they are scared we are going to close. As long as we can get those 35 mm prints, we’ll keep showing movies for those who show up. But with a digital projector, I don’t think it will be if, but when.”

As I said, I’m not sure exactly what happened, but by early 2014 the Twin City had its digital projector, and the Wardens still appear to be around. The Bristol Raceway is less than a mile away, and during race weeks the drive-in becomes a campground. This August, Ellen told WCYB, Bristol’s News Leader, “When we first started this in ’95 we filled up and turned them away,” but 2017 had been a disappointment.

I just missed the last weekend of the season; this place stayed open later than I had expected. I’m still looking for one more movie to reach my goal of 200.

Miles Today / Total: 63 / 38268 (rounded to the nearest mile)

Movie Showing / Total Active Nights: dark / 199

Nearby Restaurant: With the drive-in closed, I went looking for an old-fashioned diner and wound up at the Old Lighthouse Diner. It offers full-pound hamburgers, which were a bit much even for me. I picked a late breakfast instead, the Captain’s Breakfast with eggs, bacon, home fries, a griddle cake and coffee. Griddle cakes rule!

Where I Virtually Stayed: The top-rated hotel in town is the Fairfield Inn, so I chose it over the Hampton Inn. My room at the Fairfield had something that this Hampton didn’t – a mini-fridge. Plus there were cookies and coffee waiting for me at check-in and a nice breakfast in the morning featuring omelettes and bacon. It was one of the nicest Fairfields I’ve visited so far.

Only in Bristol: Bristol is home to a 70-foot long, three-story Grand Guitar. As Roadside America explained, Joe Morrell built it as a gateway between the interstate and his hometown of Bristol, the self-proclaimed “Birthplace of Country Music.” It opened in May 1983, it opened to the public and housed, among many other things, Morrell’s personal collection of hundreds of musical instruments. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2014.

Next stop: Skyview Drive-In, Carmichaels PA.

Nov. 27: Central Drive-In Theatre, Norton VA

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It’s Day 331 of my virtual Drive-In-a-Day Odyssey. After watching movies for five nights straight, I had a long drive before an evening off. It took me 4½ hours to drive from the Auto 25 Drive In in Greenwood SC to the Central Drive-In Theatre, a few miles west of Norton VA.

The Central opened in 1952 in the middle of Jefferson National Forest near Blackwood, a tiny coal town. The Theatre Catalog said its owners were H. Kiser and R. Lodge. The Motion Picture Almanacs listed only Russell Large. Was its first co-owner named Lodge or Large? (Actually, I just heard via the Central’s Facebook page that it was Large. Thanks!)

That’s the last we’ll hear of Russell Large, for the next half-century of the Central’s history is the Kiser family. The Kingsport Times-News wrote that “Buddy and Paula (Herron) bought the Central in 2005 from Jeff Kiser following the death of his mother, Agnes Kiser Lay, the Kiser family’s much loved drive-in darling who operated the Central for many if not most of those years since it opened in 1952.” They live in a house adjacent to the drive-in, which is also where the Kisers used to live.

In 2013, the Herrons turned to social media to try to win enough votes to win a free digital projector from Honda’s Project Drive-In contest. “We are a family-run business,” buddy told the Bristol Herald Courier. “We got into drive-ins because it was part of our childhood, part of something we thought would be a good, economical night out for a family. But if you talk about getting a loan for a digital projector and other equipment, a bank might look at you funny, and they’re not lending much these days.”

The Central was not one of the contest winners, yet they must have found a way to acquire a digital projector. Their subsequent GoFundMe page raised less than $7000, but somehow it worked out.

So the Herrons are the latest to run this little jewel, which holds probably fewer than 200 cars. The remote setting is great for reducing ambient light; it only comes from cars on the road and trains that pass across the street from the screen. And the stars, of course.

The Central also has a very nice arcade with a plethora of machines and good burgers at the concession stand. So they tell me. This evening was quite pleasant, but there was no way the Central was going to be open on the Monday after Thanksgiving. It closed for the season almost a month ago.

The embedded YouTube video of the day was uploaded earlier this year by Raven Aerial Imaging. It includes nice drone footage of the misty forest surrounding the Central, plus enough ground-level info to put it in perspective. For a news report from 2013 about the need for a digital projector, you might try this video.

Miles Today / Total: 259 / 38205 (rounded to the nearest mile)

Movie Showing / Total Active Nights: dark / 199

Nearby Restaurant: Who knew there were so many regional restaurant chains? In Norton, I was attracted by the name to visit Pal’s Sudden Service. The cuisine is fast-food basic, not that there’s anything wrong with that, with interesting extensions such as the grilled cheese sandwich on inverted buns. Add “frenchie” fries and a large iced tea, and by the end of the meal I felt like a local.

Where I Virtually Stayed: Norton is one of those towns where, according to TripAdvisor, the best hotel in town is a Super 8. Thank goodness that this again meant that the Super 8 was especially good. There was coffee in the lobby. My comfortable room had all the modern amenities. Breakfast was free and enough to get me back on the road. Best of all, the price was great.

Only in Norton: Just a half hour south of town is an amazing sight at Natural Tunnel State Park. The name gives it away; more than 850 feet long and as tall as a 10-story building, Natural Tunnel was naturally carved through a limestone ridge over thousands of years. William Jennings Bryan called it the “Eighth Wonder of the World.” They’ll be adding Christmas lights again this weekend.

Next stop: Twin City Drive-in, Bristol TN.