News & Notes

August 1, 2001

Guess what...on July 20th we finally made it to The Sunset Drive-In in Plentywood, MT. ! The pix are back...now just to scan them...they'll be posted soon in Open Drive-Ins !!!

May 17, 2001

It's not going to be long now...June 1st is the day that the Drive-In season begins in south-west Saskatchewan...that's the day the Clearwater Drive-In near Kyle opens for business !!!(I can't wait to see my first movie under the stars for the year)

 

April 13, 2001

Good News Drive-In Drive-In fans I just found out that the Sundown Drive-In in Saskatoon is OPEN for the season...they were the 1st last year & it looks like they won the race again...if anyone knows of any other openings please let me know & I'll post it !

 

March 16, 2001

We did receive some bad news for Drive-In fans a few weeks ago...the Saskatchewan Association of  Urban Municipalities (SUMA) voted in favor of a resolution to recommend to the provincial legislature to join the rest of North America & implement Daylight Savings Time every spring...if that happens we will lose our edge in the Drive-In industry, in this area of Saskatchewan movies will have to start as late as midnight in the height of summer !!! ... NOT GOOD NEWS !

 

March 3, 2001

Well I'm finally back in the NEWS...Hope you like my new look complete with frames & available in a non-frames version! I'll try to keep regular updates of the NEWS this year...I received a few tidbits of Drive-In info recently that I'll post in the next couple of weeks...stay tuned !!!

HOW ABOUT THAT FM SOUND?

• My first experience with radio sound came in 1981 at The Sunset Drive-In in Calgary,Alberta.I had read about radio sound in the movie listings in the newspaper and was excited to experience it. I noted the absence of speaker poles and immediately tuned my radio to the frequency posted (maybe 650,but I'm not sure). My then state-of-the-radio was designed to tune in to exactly 650 or 660 kHz but unfortunately the signal came in at 655 kHz so throughout the show I was able to listen to an off frequency garble. Out of desperation I even tried tuning to the other frequency and craning my neck to watch the other feature at this twin cinema, but alas it was just off of another frequency!
  
  The next time I went to The Sunset I got smart and brought along my big
  portable radio, it was great, it was right on frequency along with cross-over from a local radio station! I thought "What was wrong with speakers?!"
  
  Since 1981 I've attended The Ken-Par Drive-In in Carlyle, Saskatchewan and The Clearwater Drive-In near Kyle,Saskatchewan,both with AM mono sound and
  both delivering a good quality sound! In August of 1999 I experienced FM stereo for the first time at The Gemini Drive-In in Redcliff and it got a solid thumbs up! We heard ghosts crawling all around the car in The Sixth Sense, it was great!
  
  I have noted that at the last two Drive-Ins that I attended the signal carried a lot further, maybe they've learned that a stronger signal was needed to overcome local interference! 

March 16,2000

• Here's a couple of Drive-In terms from the past

• Drive-In Bingo-In the 1950s & 1960s it was a common thing for service clubs, such as the Lions to sponsor Bingo at Drive-Ins, sometimes before the show.

 

• Midnight Previews-Up until the 1970s Alberta had a strict Lord's Day Act which forbade almost all but the most essential services to operate on Sundays, so on long weekends many Drive-Ins featured a midnight preview which started at midnight, hence first thing Monday morning, by-passing the law!

• Earlier this week I was in contact with the last people who owned the Drive-Ins in Swift Current,SK. and Hanna,AB.I was able to get a few details about the long since disappeared icons of by-gone days. Unfortunately neither party has any photos but I'll publish what I learned in my new section Drive-In Memories ,a section in which I'll present whatever I can about the Drive-Ins of the past!