I can't tell you what triggered it, but last week I started thinking, again, about the fate of those drive-ins in Cleveland that I used to haunt when I was younger. In my post "Summer of '79" I mentioned the Brookpark Drive-In, where I used to spend my Saturdays. Some searching led me to its correct name, the Auto Drive-In. That in turn led to a bit of hunting utilizing Google Maps and Microsoft's Virtual Earth.

This, unfortunately is what I found. :(


A damn sad sight. I don't know what would have been worse. Discovering it in this condition, with our concession stand falling in, or seeing that it had been paved over. Someone has gone through the trouble of planting a sh!tload of trees on the property (is it a nursery now?) so I suppose it's not all bad for the old Auto Drive-In of Brookpark.

The Memphis Drive-In

The other drive-in I used to frequent was the old Memphis Triple as we called it (for its three screens). Built in '54 it was the largest around. Probably the largest in the county. Sadly, it too has met its fate, in 2006, with the property having been sold to American Greetings. The Memphis was Cuyahoga County's last surviving drive-in theatre. :(


Which leads me to the point of this post!


Here's a shot of the newly restored marquee of the Twin Hills drive-in theatre in Harrodsburg, Kentucky - which reopened in 2005 after being "dark" for twenty years.


The missus and I spent Saturday evening there, our first trip to the Twin, and only our second visit to a drive-in since we relocated here in 1988. We're planning on returning next Saturday, to take in Speed Racer.

Yeah. It was fun. Just like it used to be.