Small clues lead to another new drive-in

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Let’s put the most important news up front. In Kings Mountain NC, a local family reacted to the closing of the area’s only drive-in theater by starting its own. Hound’s Drive-In opened this year, and it’s an inspiring story of another business that’s keeping this tradition alive.

The Shelby Star ran an article in April anticipating the launch of Hound’s, complete with a bit of video showing what a brand-new drive-in theater looks like. Then in July, the newspaper printed the story of a guy who proposed marriage on the big screen there. It’s all good stuff, and you ought to read both of those articles.

Now I have to tell a story about Carload. Both of those Shelby Star articles ran before I began assembling the Carload database of active drive-ins in the US and Canada. For that task, I used three primary sources: a two-year-old list from Nerve.com, the sadly out-of-date DriveInMovie.com, and Google. Lots of Google. Search results for “(insert state) drive-in theater” were the most reliable listings, but they weren’t perfect.

Another great source for drive-in listings has been a by-product of keeping track of drive-in theater news. When a new one opens, that’s usually worthy of a newspaper article or a local TV news report. And once in a while, something in the news just mentions a drive-in I hadn’t heard of.

Which brings us to the Kings Mountain Herald. In a dusty dry article last week, the Herald listed the local construction permits issued in September. (By the way, that’s truly a core journalistic service to its readers. More papers should do the same.) Buried in that list / article was the mention that a construction company was issued “a building master commercial permit to install bathrooms for the drive-in theater at 114 Raven Circle”. That tiny note led to more searching and the discovery of the brand-new Hound’s, built adjacent to the owner’s campground. And it also implies that, if the owner is building more or better bathrooms, the drive-in must be doing pretty well.

The discovery reminded me of the early, pre-Google days of Carload, when the Comanche of Buena Vista CO wasn’t listed by anybody online. A co-worker who had family in Buena Vista said that on a weekend visit home, he saw cars filing out of the Comanche late at night. The result was a quick visit and the 19-year-old marquee photo that Carload still uses. There may be more active drive-ins that still aren’t on the Carload list. If you know of any, please let me know.

Circle Drive-In adds fall football

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Circle Drive-In marquee

photo by drpep from the Carload Flickr pool

The Valley Advantage of Scranton PA clued us in on a smart promotion by the Circle Drive-In of Dickson City. Since mid-September, the Circle has been showing Monday Night Football on its big screen. Attendance has been light, but I’ll bet it would beat any movies shown on a Monday night. Besides, manager Dave Castelli thinks the crowds will grow once viewers spread the word.

Castelli said that he thinks he’s the only drive-in that shows MNF, and notes that the Circle has a licensing agreement with the NFL. That’s a really important step for anyone who wants to bring in a crowd for a game anywhere outside the home, because the NFL keeps a vigilant eye on such endeavors.

The Circle is also scheduled to show a Penn State game on an alumni night Oct. 22, two days before its last MNF event of the drive-in season.

There are other special events planned for the Circle in the months to come. “We’re going to throw everything up against the wall and see what sticks,” Castelli said. “That’s what’s changing about our industry — you have to be a destination.”

For more details and a nice photo from the Valley Advantage article, you really should go read it!

Porterville screen resists demolition

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There’s an odd little story in the Porterville CA Recorder about one of the screens at the Porterville Drive-In. It’s amusing, and a testament to 1950-era engineering, how difficult it was for a demolition company to knock it down.

According to Cinema Treasures, the Porterville opened in May 1950, added a second screen some time later, and closed after the 2004 season. The Burton School District purchased the site earlier this year and “agreed to clean up the area, including removing the two screens.” Since the school district hasn’t mentioned its plans for the property, I’m not sure those screens needed removing. Especially considering the oldest definitely wasn’t in danger of collapse.

That article in the Recorder contains a great play-by-play of Housley Demolition’s diligent work at taking down what was apparently the original screen. Housley workers cut six of the seven steel beams that held up the screen, believing that its weight would make it bend down on the seventh. After the sixth cut, nothing. As the Recorder eloquently put it, “Even the pigeons did not move.”

Then workers spent over two hours cutting the seventh beam, but the screen remained stubborn. The next day, Housley brought a large excavator, which finally pushed the screen down. I guess they really knew how to build eight-story-high screens 66 years ago.

There are some great photos of the demolition process and a lot more details in the Recorder article, so you know you really should go read it!