Does anyone remember this drive-in theater?

That building in the center is the Borden's Dairy on Alcaniz Street.
Across the street from it is where Alcaniz and Davis come together.
And then farther out that street is the intersection of Fairfield and Davis.
The drive-in would have been on the property Brown Barge School was later built on.
I came here in 56 and lived not far from Fairfield and Davis and I don't remember any drive-in being there then.
Does anyone remember it? Do you know what it was called and when it closed?

Well it wasn't around in Dec 76 because I loved drive ins and went to the "soccer field" theatre often with my kids. I miss them things they were a great place to go have fun. Sigh.

I do not remember any drive-in being at that corner and I think I'm close to the same age as you are Bob. I grew up in Pensacola too. The Ranch was nearby on Pace Blvd. That's the only one I remember in that area.

Here's a question though. The drive-in would have to have been located between Fairfield and Texar and between Davis and Palafox if the picture is correct. There should be some railroad tracks just to the west of it (to the left of the drive-in) in that picture. Where are the RR tracks at? I don't see them.

bluemoon wrote:I do not remember any drive-in being at that corner and I think I'm close to the same age as you are Bob. I grew up in Pensacola too. The Ranch was nearby on Pace Blvd. That's the only one I remember in that area.

bluemoon, if you look at the picture that Bob posted, you can clearly see a drive-in theater in the upper center of the image. The screen as well as the building that houses the concession and projectors are apparent.

I don't remember that particular drive in, but I sure do remember them.

heres one

Ghost_Rider1 wrote:

bluemoon wrote:I do not remember any drive-in being at that corner and I think I'm close to the same age as you are Bob. I grew up in Pensacola too. The Ranch was nearby on Pace Blvd. That's the only one I remember in that area.

bluemoon, if you look at the picture that Bob posted, you can clearly see a drive-in theater in the upper center of the image. The screen as well as the building that houses the concession and projectors are apparent.

I understand that. If it's on the same property that Brown-Barge was built on there should be a RR spur just to the west of it in the picture. There's no RR there. This must be a drive-in that was there before the 50's. Frank Hardy took pictures during the 40's, 50's and 60's in Pensacola. He even took school pictures.

bluemoon wrote:

Ghost_Rider1 wrote:

bluemoon wrote:I do not remember any drive-in being at that corner and I think I'm close to the same age as you are Bob. I grew up in Pensacola too. The Ranch was nearby on Pace Blvd. That's the only one I remember in that area.

bluemoon, if you look at the picture that Bob posted, you can clearly see a drive-in theater in the upper center of the image. The screen as well as the building that houses the concession and projectors are apparent.

I understand that. If it's on the same property that Brown-Barge was built on there should be a RR spur just to the west of it in the picture. There's no RR there. This must be a drive-in that was there before the 50's. Frank Hardy took pictures during the 40's, 50's and 60's in Pensacola. He even took school pictures.

Here is what the caption of that picture says on Frank Hardy's website.


Davis and Fairfield Drive
Borden's Dairy is in the fore-ground. Note the drive-in theater next door. Photograph made in the 1950's. Fairfield Drive at this point was named Pottery Plant Road.

Now I'm not a lifelong Pensacola resident, so maybe I should net even be part of this conversation. I meant nothing derogatory with my last post.

Drive ins....LOL....I can remember going to Shakey's Pizza in 1975 or so for a baseball team pizza party and where the current jail sits there was a theatre that used to play DIRTY movies. We all got done eating pizza and went out back and sat in the bed of the coach's truck seeing BOOBIES....

I knew that was Pottery Plant Road because I'm old enough to remember when it was called that. I guess I'm not old enough to remember a drive-in being there though. Maybe it was in the very early 50's before I was old enough to remember. No offense taken Ghost. This is a very confusing picture. Most of us remember the old Ranch drive-in that was also just off Fairfield Drive (Pottery Plant Road) back in the 50's. That was south of Fairfield on Pace Blvd. ( aka O Street.) That's obviously not it. I guess that's what has Bob confused too.
I would like to know what the large building west of the drive-in is. That might shed some light on the subject.

PACEDOG#1 wrote:Drive ins....LOL....I can remember going to Shakey's Pizza in 1975 or so for a baseball team pizza party and where the current jail sits there was a theatre that used to play DIRTY movies. We all got done eating pizza and went out back and sat in the bed of the coach's truck seeing BOOBIES....

That was the Ranch Drive-In. Is that the old Booker T Washington High next to the drive-in Bob? It isn't shaped like that now but it used to be a elementary to high school way back when. Now it's the Hall Center. Maybe it was shaped different then.
I think it is. That would put the RR track too far to the west to be in the picture. No, I don't recognize that drive-in at all but we didn't go to that part of town too often. Just south of the school and a few blocks across Texar there was a black area they used to call Shantytown. Some old people around town still call it that. It would be just to the left and outside the picture area.

We all got done eating pizza and went out back and sat in the bed of the coach's truck seeing BOOBIES....

Guilty as charged......Russ Meyer had this soft porn movie called Vixen....and we would sneak behind the drive in and park in a field.....dialogue was not real big with us in those days.....got stuck in the damn mud from all the rutted tire tracks and rain.....but we thought we were watching dirty movies.....circa 1971, and until the neighbors started complaining about watching boobs out their kitchen window.....the days of the drive in were numbered.

Does anybody remember when 10 and 110 were built through town. I remember 65 going through North Birmingham in the early sixties where my grandmother's home was demolished for 65. Some of the interstate got started in the late 50s.

I had accounts to Jacksonville back in the 70s. I hated I10...they messed up the installation and every joint in the road bowed up and all the way to Tallahassee it was bump bump bump....

TEOTWAWKI wrote:I had accounts to Jacksonville back in the 70s. I hated I10...they messed up the installation and every joint in the road bowed up and all the way to Tallahassee it was bump bump bump....

That drive between Pensacola and Jax is still a long, long drive.

But these days, coming from Huntsville, we have to drive from Alabama into Georgia to I 75, then south to I 10 and then to Jax. It's twice as long for us now as the drive from Pensacola.

I remembered I have a 1944 city directory. Here's the only theater listing in it. There is nothing for "drive-in" or "drive-in theater". And the street directory for Davis ends at 3000 (Fairfield is about the 3800 block if I remember right). And there is no listing for Fairfield or for Pottery Plant Rd.
This city directory seems to confine itself to what is inside the city. Later directories I've seen in the library cover the outlying areas too so maybe one from around 1950 would have include Fairfield, Pottery Plant and the drive-in.



Until looking at this, I had no awareness of there being a Strand Theater on Gadsden or the Belmont Theater on Belmont St. And I always thought the Rex was built after WW2. But there it is in 1944.

Also, as I look at the Hardy photo again, that probably is a school bordering the theater property on the west. Where the theater parking lot is would later be where I-110 was put and the existing Brown Barge School (which today is the school district surplus warehouse) would be about where that school looking building is located.

Here's a google map aerial photo today.
The red circle on the map corresponds to the drive-in in Hardy's photo.
And the blue circle on the map is Brown Barge School. That is obviously the building in Hardy's photo because it's the same shape and in the same location.

Good call on the Roxy theather on Pst. It was in back of where CVS/Miller A/c is now. Was a Motorcycle shop for a while after the Theater closed. Used to have Rassing right in front of it. Had a big fight there one night after a match, I think Mario Glento got cut. I used to hang out at Jesses Bakery next to Lamar Carbtrees gas station. Cervantes and O st. Remember them?

The Belmont theater was a small place. I dont think many,if any, white people ever went there.

Hallmarkgrad1 wrote:Good call on the Roxy theather on Pst. It was in back of where CVS/Miller A/c is now. Was a Motorcycle shop for a while after the Theater closed. Used to have Rassing right in front of it. Had a big fight there one night after a match, I think Mario Glento got cut. I used to hang out at Jesses Bakery next to Lamar Carbtrees gas station. Cervantes and O st. Remember them?

The Belmont theater was a small place. I dont think many,if any, white people ever went there.

Have you ever heard of the Strand Theater at 1222 E. Gadsden? That's another neighborhood theater I've never heard of. I think Gadsden was a streetcar route and that could maybe help explain why it was located there.

Lamar Crabtree NASCAR Statistics
Lamar Crabtree Career Statistics
Races 4 Average Finish 19.25
Wins 0 Average Start 17.0
Top 5 Finishes 0 Total Laps Led 0
Top 10 Finishes 1 Total Laps 349
Top 20 Finishes 3 % of Laps 35.25%
Poles 0 DNF's 2
Lamar Crabtree
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stats: Apr 8, 1951 to Jun 14, 1953

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Lamar Crabtree Results by Year

1953 NASCAR Grand National 97 1 0 0 0 11.00 0 0 $25 detail
1952 NASCAR Grand National 110 2 0 0 0 30.00 22.5 0 0 $25 detail
1951 NASCAR Grand National 84 1 0 0 1 6.00 6.0 0 0 $150 detail


NASCAR Car #3 2 0 0 0 1 30.00 22.5 0 0 49.86% 2 $25
NASCAR Car # 1 0 0 0 1 11.00 0 0 0 $25
NASCAR Car #19 1 0 0 1 1 6.00 6.0 0 0 0 $150
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Central City 1 0 0 0 1 19.00 21.0 0 0 31.67% 1 $25 detail
Darlington 1 0 0 0 0 41.00 24.0 0 0 63.50% 1 $0 detail
Five Flags 1 0 0 0 1 11.00 0 0 0 $25 detail
Lakeview 1 0 0 1 1 6.00 6.0 0 0 0 $150 detail


Dirt Tracks 3 0 0 1 3 12.00 13.5 0 0 16.10% 1 $200 detail
Intermediate Tracks (other) 1 0 0 0 0 41.00 24.0 0 0 63.50% 1 $0 detail

DriverAverages.com has results for Lamar Crabtree from
the April 8, 1951 (113 Miles at Lakeview Speedway) to
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Bob wrote:Here's a google map aerial photo today.
The red circle on the map corresponds to the drive-in in Hardy's photo.
And the blue circle on the map is Brown Barge School. That is obviously the building in Hardy's photo because it's the same shape and in the same location.

Thanks for that Bob. That was Brown Barge and not Washington High in the original photo then. That moves the drive-in closer to Davis. Now if we just knew the name, that would be nice.

bluemoon wrote: Now if we just knew the name, that would be nice.

Next time I get by a library which has a later city directory I'll see if it lists the drive-in and let you know.