New drive-in coming to New Braunfels TX

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SS_FacebookThere’s a great story in Texas that’s getting even better. Ryan Smith and his family built the Stars & Stripes Drive-In Theatre (Lubbock) in 2003, and now they’re going to build the second Stars & Stripes in New Braunfels, a fun town between Austin and San Antonio on I-35.

According to its press release, “Stars & Stripes Drive-In Theatre will show digital first-run double-features nightly and be open year-round. Two of the screen towers will measure over 90 feet wide and be the largest movie screens in Texas. Located on 30 acres close to the intersection of FM 1101 and Kroesche Lane, about one mile from Freiheit Country Store and 9-pin bowling club, it will be the only drive-in theatre within a 150-mile radius of New Braunfels.” I think the Blue Starlite in Austin would dispute that last claim.

The Herald-Zeitung (what a great name!) of New Braunfels ran a great, lengthy story Sunday about the announcement and a general walk through the memories of drive-ins past. New Braunfels was once home to the Tower, a 250-car theater that opened in 1950. The Tower’s chunk of land was later converted to a Kroger grocery store, then refurbished with local economic development money into the headquarters of The Scooter Store, which filed for bankruptcy after an FBI raid this year. But I digress.

From the description of the new Stars & Stripes site, it’ll be less than a mile from I-35 at the Kohlenberg Road exit northeast of New Braunfels. “It’s a beautiful and convenient location, plus you can see the stars out there,” said Smith. The press release continued, “Families and friends will enjoy watching bright digital projection from inside the comfort of their own car or outside in lawn chairs. Because the drive-in theatre has always been more than just a movie going experience, Stars & Stripes will serve Rockin’ Eats from their 50’s Cafe, and guests can enjoy the patio and playground areas.” Sounds like fun!

Drive-in author tells USA Today his top ten

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Mesa Drive-In marquee with photo creditAt one level, I look at USA Today’s story, posted late last night, as pure link bait. Any top ten list is designed to pull in visitors from all over just because its title is intriguing and its slide show is eye candy. On the other hand, they used my photo! So now I can change that line on my resume to “Award-winning photographer featured in USA Today.”

Where was I? Oh yes, the article. Well-known drive-in historian Don Sanders gave USA Today’s Larry Bleiberg his top ten favorite drive-in theaters. I don’t know if they were the top ten active drive-ins, or whether it just happens that Sanders’ favorites all happen to still be alive. There are notes and photos for each, so you really should go read it! But here is a quick summary:

Pleasant Valley Drive-In may close for good

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Pleasant Valley Drive-In at nightHere’s the kind of story we’re going to see a lot over the next few weeks. The Pleasant Valley Drive-In, Pleasant Valley CT, having failed to attract enough votes to win a projector through Project Drive-In, now faces an uncertain future, as reported by WVIT, New Britain’s news leader.

“I’ve got six months to try and raise the money and get new projectors in here,” said owner Donna McGrane. “So hopefully we can get some fundraisers going and make it happen.”

WVIT had the good idea of checking with Pleasant Valley’s elected officials to see whether they could do anything to help save the town’s landmark theater. But it sounds like Pleasant Valley, the town, is as hard up for cash as Pleasant Valley the drive-in.

There was another good report about four Iowa drive-ins in roughly the same boat presented by KLJB, the Quad Cities’ news leader. But that embeddable video is hosted by Worldnow, which uses some kind of JavaScript that this blog can’t digest well. To watch part of that clip (meaning the leftmost portion of the entire video), visit my Worldnow example page.

Update: Well that’s ironic. In a post where I complain about Worldnow’s odd incompatibility with Carload, the other video I embedded decided to quit working. You can still see it if you click the screen capture I’ve replaced it with at the top of this post or if you click here.