There Are Only Eight Drive-In Theaters Left in Kentucky

In the tri-state, we don't know a world without a top-flight drive-in movie theater thanks to the historic and massively relevant Holiday Drive-In in Reo.

Back in the day, Owensboroans didn't have to drive across the river for a drive-in movie. They just needed to head over to the west side for an evening out at the Starlite Drive-In or the east side, on Breckenridge, for the Cardinal Drive-In.

It was at the Cardinal that a favorite family story of mine unfolded involving my parents and, oddly enough, the Everly Brothers.

But, I digress.

The Starlite and Cardinal are LOOOOOONG gone and, actually, so are many, many others in the Commonwealth.

There are just seven left and they are the Calvert Drive-In in Calvert City, the Franklin Drive-In in Franklin, the Skyline Drive-In in Greensburg, the Sauerbeck Family Drive-In in LaGrange, the Judy Drive-In in Mount Sterling, the Bourbon Drive-In in Paris, the 27 Twin Drive-In in Somerset, and the Stanford Drive-In in Stanford.

Their numbers are dwindling and I'm not sure I know why. For obvious reasons, they're not open year-round, but based on the Holiday's traffic in Reo, there's evidence that if you have a really solid operation going, the sky's the limit.

And, when you get right down to it, they're just an absolute BLAST!

Sometimes, it almost doesn't matter how good the movie is.