When my family moved from Brooklyn to Long Island we lived in Copiague. They had a Drive-in theater which I believe is the first one in the New York. I've been there a few times before and after being married was enjoyable outing. We take our children if they got tired just lay them down in the back seat and let them sleep. When more modern theaters came around, they started losing business and open a flea market during the day on weekends to cover some of their losses. Eventually it closed and the owners sold out a shopping center was built on the site. There are no drive-in theaters in this area now, Sad.
Drive-ins were popular in south Texas when I was a kid but I don't know why. The humidity and mosquitoes made it a very unpleasant experience. I remember the concession stand sold some kind of coiled mosquito repellent that you lit on fire and the smoke was "supposed" to repel them.
You gotta wonder about the economics of a drive in. No one wants to go in the winter, but the sun doesn't set until 9PM in the summer. So you get one lot full of customers each day for part of the year, and the rest of the time you're closed for business...at least in many parts of the country.
As a pre-schooler, I was a half-wild little country gal let loose to wander around the farm. I was usually barefoot and my favorite pastime was galloping around the pasture on a tobacco stick "horse" with my cap pistols strapped on, occasionally stopping by to lick the big yellow salt blocks for the livestock. The year I got a red Radio Flyer wagon, my whole world changed. I hauled everything in my trusty wagon... beagle puppy, matches filched from the kitchen drawer, old tools and whatever other necessities. It was my constant companion for many years, becoming everything from my "car" to a covered wagon in a wagon train. The possibilities were as endless as my imagination. So when my little granddaughter turned 4, I checked Amazon and sent her a red Radio Flyer wagon. She has had it for a year or so, and my son says she drags it everywhere, loaded with barn cats or a dog, assorted tools, and other necessities. They live on 20 acres so she has plenty of room to "gallop," just as her grannie did. Some things never change.
it's a great feeling when your children or grandchild experience similar things that you did in your childhood. their enjoyment warms the heart. My eldest grandchild about 10 years ago was getting rid of a plastic large wagon, I took it and still use it, made my life a whole bunch easier when hauling stuff.
I've always got some kind of wagon in the shed; they are so handy for moving things around the yard. I bought myself a Radio Flyer many years ago and it finally rusted through and the handle separated last year, so finally beyond repair. I ordered a replacement "garden" wagon made of some heavy duty plastic material but it doesn't have the pizazz of the Radio Flyer.
Think plastic, I believe my wagon is a step one, to this point it's been indestructible. Kept outside always.
After being closed for thirty years, the drive-in theater in Bangor, Maine reopened in 2015. Given that it was a drive-in, I don't know whether it was closed, along with the other theaters, under our fascist governor's edicts, but I understand that it had been doing well. I think it's not actually in Bangor, but in Brewer or another town adjacent to Bangor.
To me, there's a similarity between drive-ins and farms. The areas around them explode in expansion, their taxes go up, then someone offers them more money for the land they are on than they could ever imagine making over the course of several generations...guaranteed!
They know that money talks most people will take them up on their offer, they also know acceptable expenses based on the return they expect. If it wasn't profitable they wouldn't do it. A lot of Farms are being purchased by China using hard to trace corporations. Like the rainforest our culture is slowly being destroyed.