Life in the Ville by Jimmy Del Ponte

This article was first published on April 2, 2008.

A lot of us remember going to the drive-in to see a movie. I can even recall going there in my pajamas. I remember my Uncle Joe Galli taking us to the drive-in to see The Blob. It’s one of my fondest childhood memories and we often bring it up at family gatherings. As soon as one of us kids got their license to drive, it was an overstuffed junk-box, full of your buddies, heading to the drive-in.

The ones we went to the most were either The Meadow Glen or Medford Twin (Wellington?). Remember driving up over the bumps to get a good spot close to the screen? How many of you actually hid in the trunk to sneak in? Back then there was less space in the trunks of cars because most had full-sized spare tires.

I did some research (a call to my friend Charlie), and it went like this: at first, they charged by the person and then in later years, by the carload. We stared hiding in the trunk when they started charging by the person – when they charged by the carload, I remember squeezing four people in the front and about eight in the back. We even used to sit on the hood and roof at times.

Remember the speaker, that faded and chipped silver monstrosity on the wire that crackled and squeaked. You had to move the car six times to maneuver it close enough to fit in the window, only to scratch the glass. I can’t remember when the sound started being broadcast over your car radio. You were instructed to tune to AM 1520 or something like that to pick up the movie’s audio.

When I was researching additional information for this article, I went to driveins.com. In 1972, there were 83 operating drive-ins in Massachusetts. The ones nearest to us here in Somerville were: Fresh Pond, Suffolk Downs, Saugus, Revere, Neponset and of course the two in Medford. Some of the movies we may have seen at the drive in were Superfly, Bruce Lee in Fists of Fury and The Godfather.

We stood in long lines after watching the dancing and singing food in the concession stand commercial, only to eat that cardboard pizza and those rubber hot dogs. I believe it was the Meadow Glen drive-in that had that round, horse trough-like contraption in the men’s room. The same guy who is responsible for the restrooms at the old Boston Garden, and Fenway Park probably designed it. Thanks for the memories!

In the really early days, my brother and sister and I used to sit in the back of dad’s ‘53 Chevy and hit the drive-in. I can actually remember standing up in the back seat while dad drove. There were no seat belt laws back then, but dad’s arm use to swing back to protect us if there was a sudden stop. An occasional cigarette ash also made its way into the back seat. It’s a miracle some us kids weren’t blinded or burnt by our parents smoking in the car when we were kids.

I seem to have a hazy recollection of standing around Fourth Street in Medford and actually seeing Chesty Morgan starring in Deadly Weapons. It brought new meaning to the term “Medford Twin.” What were they thinking showing those kinds of trashy movies at a drive-in that was located in such a populated area?

Eventually beers replaced sodas, girlfriends replaced our buddies and the mall replaced the drive-in. One last thought before I close, be sure to replace the speaker before driving away.