My gal Ally and I were having a conversation today and I mentioned drive-in theaters. I don't know if she grasped the concept of seeing a movie in a car. Since she's from Long Island in New York, I'd imagine there weren't many, if any, drive-in theaters around to go to. Also, since she was born in 1980, drive-in theaters were already rapidly disappearing due to land values.
This jogged my memory of the drive-ins I used to go to. I lived in South-Central Los Angeles until age 12 and then in the South Bay area of L.A. County in Hawthorne. My parents and I used to frequent walk-in theaters and drive-in theaters quite a bit. We frequented drive-ins more often.
They mostly screened double-features. We'd get to the theater before sundown. While waiting for the show to start, I used to play in the theater's playground just below the screen. Once the sun was down, the show would start with ads for coming attractions, the snack bar and a cartoon (usually Walter Lantz's
Chilly Willy). After the cartoon, the first movie would start. The price of admission to a drive-in was very reasonable by today's standards and viewing two movies in the privacy of your own car made it more comfortable.
The first one, the
Century Drive-In, was located in Inglewood, California. It was a good, close theater to see a movie at and it had a
Cinerama screen installed in the 1960s. The big drawback of the
Century came when we entered the passenger jet age. It was located under the approach pattern to Los Angeles International Airport, and the noise from the jet engines would drown out the sound from the window-mounted speakers.
The Century has been torn down and replaced by warehouses and a truck freight center.
Above, the Century Drive-In's Cinerama screen.Another drive-in theater we used to frequent was the
Olympic Drive-In (below) located at Olympic Blvd. and Bundy Drive in West Los Angeles. It has been gone since the 1980s.
In Culver City, California stood the
Studio Drive-In Theater (below) on Sepulveda Blvd. Today, it has been replaced by condominiums and apartments. I remember seeing a double feature of
The Spy Who Loved Me and
Logan's Run there in 1977.
In Gardena, California was the
Vermont Drive-In (below). For most of its existence it was a singe-screen theater, but two more screens were added in the 1970s. We frequented that one a lot. The
Vermont is another casualty to progress.
Also in Gardena, is the
Roadium Drive-In Theater (below). The only movies I can immediately recall seeing there are
For Your Eyes Only and
The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, although we went there a lot. During the day, a swap meet would take place. But in the late afternoon, all the vendors would clear out and the theater would be prepared to screen movies. It no longer screens movies, but the screen is still there and it is a full-time swap meet marketplace.
In Torrance, the place for movies was the
Torrance Drive-In (below). I remember seeing a lot of car and motorcycle movies there. The
Torrance Drive-In is also a memory of the past.
One other drive-in theater we frequented, but I don't have a picture of, was the
Centinela Drive-In. That, too, is gone and replaced by apartments. I remember seeing a double-feature of
Batman and
Our Man Flint there in 1966.
Below is a newspaper ad for some of the L.A. area's independent drive-in theaters. Pacific Drive-In Theaters owned the
Century,
Vermont,
Olympic,
Studio,
Torrance and
Centinela Drive-Ins.
The Roadium was an independent theater.
