Montopolis Drive-In
Austin, Texas1947-1959
Shop Montopolis Drive-In tees, long sleeve tees and hoodies. Its grand opening ad in 1947 promised fireworks and called the Montopolis in Austin, Texas, the nation's most beautiful drive-in. In 1954 a fire destroyed the screen, an uninsured $35,000 loss, and the owner started rebuilding the tower at once. Pick a style below, then read the full Montopolis history 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.
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Montopolis Drive-In History
The Montopolis Drive-In in Austin, Texas, opened in September 1947. Its grand opening ad gave Friday, September 19, and promised fireworks, and it called the new theater the nation's most beautiful drive-in. The picture was Hi, Neighbor. It stood out the Bastrop Highway at Airport Boulevard and had room for about 850 cars. Eddie Joseph owned it. A new Chief Drive-In opened in Austin that same month.
The name comes from Montopolis, a townsite laid out in 1839 on the Colorado River just east of what became Austin, which may have competed to be the capital of the Republic of Texas. The name stuck to the neighborhood, and the drive-in was among the things that carried it into the 20th century.
In 1954 a fire destroyed the screen, a $35,000 loss that Joseph told Billboard wasn't insured. He started rebuilding the tower at once, and CinemaScope arrived the next year. The theater closed in 1959 and was gone by 1965. The Austin Animal Center and government offices are on the land now.