Garden City Drive-In
Marion, North Carolina1948-1985
Shop Garden City Drive-In tees, long sleeve tees and hoodies. When it opened in Marion, North Carolina, in 1948, the local paper promised a supervised playground and a resident policeman on duty during theatre hours. It ran adult films through the 1970s, and its last season in 1985 ended with Red Sonja and Cocoon. Browse the styles below, and the full Garden City history is further down. Down Home Apparel is an American small business remembering the best places and teams of yesteryear, and every shirt is printed to order in the USA.
4 products
Garden City Drive-In History
The Garden City Drive-In in Marion, North Carolina, opened on July 1, 1948, at Pleasant Gardens on Highway 70, near the Lake Tahoma road. W. C. Mason, who also ran the Roxy in Old Fort, had planned 500 cars and a June opening. The Marion Progress reported that he waited a few weeks for a new type of in-car speaker and opened with room for 300 cars.
The paper also promised a playground with supervised recreation and a resident policeman on duty during theatre hours. A year later, a Marion Progress item had a local group's directors invited to dinner at the Garden City Drive In Grill.
Cinema Treasures says the theater shifted to adult films in the 1970s and kept them through the early 1980s. It credits new management under Chuck McGinnis with returning to mainstream movies on April 2, 1985. That lasted one season, and the listing gives September 13, 1985 as the closing, with a double feature of Red Sonja and Cocoon.
The screen and the long letter board by the road are gone. The site is listed at about 1946 U.S. 70 and has been demolished.