Drive-in Movies, by Rose Greene

Mom took Olie and me to our local drive-in theatre every weekend for several years when we were young. She was friends with the man who was the gatekeeper there, and he let us in for free (I still have the red Cupie Doll he gave me for my 6th birthday). So we got to see every popular movie made during that time. We saw Gone With the Wind there, although I think Olie and I slept through a lot of it because it was such a long movie. Our favorites were musicals and comedies with greats such as Debbie Reynolds, Bob Hope, Bing Crosby, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis, Donald O’Connor in Francis the Talking Horse movies. War movies, dramas, thrillers such as The Night of the Living Dead and The Day the Earth Stood Still; many movies we wouldn’t have gotten to see if not for the kindness of that gatekeeper. On one occasion, during a really funny scene, the three of us pulled our Sugar Daddies out of our mouths to laugh, and Mom’s upper and lower dentures were attached to her Sugar Daddy. We roared with laughter, and we were laughing long after everyone else, so people around our car were staring at us, wondering what was so funny.