Our county's two drive-ins before they turned to smut for profit.

The drive-in movie is one of those lost pieces of Americana that has sadly gone the way of the quill pen, rotary telephone, and manual typewriter. You would be hard pressed to explain the concept to a kid today without breaking out a copy of American Graffiti and even then you would have to get past their confusion about why the creator of Star Wars was able to make a movie that didn’t feature Jar Jar.

There was a time, however, when teenagers flocked to the drive-in to ignore moths and mosquitoes that flew in front of the projector while a poorly reproduced soundtrack crackled from shitty speakers attached by hook to a partially rolled down driver’s side window. All the while scarfing down popcorn and, with any luck, practicing making babies in the back seat. At least that is the drive-in experience that has been romanticized in popular culture. By the time I was born things were a bit different.

The 70’s were a decade of death for the drive-in. Though there were plenty still in operation (our county had two working theaters), it was clear that the activity was on the decline. In an attempt to remain economically viable, one of our theaters, the infamous Circle G Drvie-In, had changed over entirely to adult films. Allowing lone movie goers the freedom to rub one out in the privacy and comfort of their own vehicle. Keep in mind that this was long before the VCR made pornography a living room event for more discreet perverts.

Though my elementary school-aged self was understandably banned from the Circle G, there was still one drive-in in town offering a unique package of family fun for Alamance County residents. And they had only gone halfway down the path of their rival theater.

Located just down the road from Burlington’s Cum Park Plaza (that name is real even if it does work as nice foreshadowing for the rest of the story) was the East 70 Twin Drive-In. I have many fond memories of sitting on the roof of our family station wagon, eating beef jerky and some of the best movie bought pizza you will ever know, while watching a slurry of family oriented films such as Escape to Witch Mountain (long before The Rock was ever thought of) and The Rescuers. All the while my dad sat in the driver’s seat with a cooler full of Budweiser. By the time the double feature was over, the beer had been emptied and it was time to drive home. It amazes me how drunk driving was not part of our vocabulary in those days.

Yes this place exists

The drive-in would be a thing of the past before I ever managed to get my first date into the back seat, but it didn’t preclude the 70 Twin from being my first exposure to adult activity. You see, as the name denotes, there were two screens at this particular drive-in. One that showed the types of movies I was accustomed to seeing and another dedicated to a much more worldly crowd. What is odd about this dichotomy is that the two screens, while admittedly placed at opposite ends of the parking lot, were in full view of one another.

On one occasion, I distinctly remember being taken to see “Six Pack”, a wonderfully redneck film featuring Kenny Rogers as a race car driver that adopts a rag-tag bunch of orphans to serve as his pit crew. I guess that child labor laws at the time were as lax as driving under the influence penalties. Anyway, as we pulled up to the drive thru box office there was a poster advertising the feature on the second screen., a lusty looking lady in provocative attire lured male movie goers with the tagline “Emmanuel: She lives for love”. I read the words out loud as my father did his best to hurry past the gate and find a good parking spot in front of our screen.

It had been raining that day, in retrospect probably not the best drive-in weather, so I wasn’t allowed to sit on top of the car per usual. I had to settle for watching from the backseat as my dad and our neighbor sat up front maneuvering through what was most likely a case of Milwaukee’s finest. Every once in awhile I would notice my father peering into the rear view mirror. This was a behavior not uncommon for any parent forced to keep tabs on disobedient youth while driving. But I hadn’t been acting up at all. Why bother watching me? I soon figured out that it wasn’t me catching his interest but rather something behind us. When my curiosity got the better of me I decided to have a look for myself.

“Don’t turn around Jon”, my father admonished. This, of course, was tantamount to torture for a child. I could feel my neck involuntarily start to twist around, instinctually needing to know that which had been forbidden. But my father was now doing triple duty trying to keep up with the plot of the G rated film in front (probably so he could convince my mother that he hadn’t been watching porn), snatching glimpses of the adult entertainment behind us, and keeping watch over my fading innocence in the back seat.

Knowing that I was never going to win this war while under supervision, I announced my dire need to pee. This is something that all parents take seriously particularly when neglect could lead to urine spillage in the car. My father had to capitulate. I was set free to wander the length of the parking lot and find the bathroom.

Of course, my attention was more focused upon the rollicking adventures of Emmanuel than that of finding bladder relief. Needless to say that it took me an inordinate amount of time to return to the car. To this day I have a gap in my knowledge of Kenny Rogers movie trivia but there is no doubt in my mind of what Emmanuel was up to.

That’s the last time I recall going on such an excursion with my dad. I guess maybe we both learned something that night. Now we have the multi-plex with THX surround sound for a superior movie watching experience and the internet to cover our primal urges. Technology moves things forward but almost always at the expensive of our past experiences. I guess we are better off for it but I have to say that god I miss the drive-in.