Village Drive-In
4213 Montgomery Drive,
Santa Rosa,
CA
95405
4213 Montgomery Drive,
Santa Rosa,
CA
95405
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Final night of operation was March 6, 1983 with “The Cannonball Run”, “Jinxed and "Firefox”. The screen was brought down that following Friday.
better quality scan of the grand opening ad at
Found on Newspapers.com
Grand Opening was July 16, 1952
I worked at the Village Drive In in 1955-56 as a cashier and met my husband of 57 years there. It was a great time!
Neither of my links to Historic Aerials is working. Go to their hom page and paste this address into the Search field:
4201 Shadow Lane, Santa Rosa, CA
Then pick “T1955” from the column in the upper left corner of the aerial view the site fetches, and you get the 1955 map. Zoom in using the row of circles at the lower right corner of the map. Selecting the fifth or sixth circle from the left gives a good scale.
The Historic Aerials link in my previous comment isn’t working. Try this one.
jwmovies is correct. At this link you can see the drive-in outlined on the 1955 USGS map at Historic Aerials.
Because Google Maps isn’t fetching the right location for our page, here is a link to a corrected map. I used 4201 Shadow Lane to get Google to put an icon (a letter “A” in a circle rather than the usual pin icon) on top of the residential project that now occupies the site of the drive-in.
Here is Street View looking up Shadow Lane from Montgomery Drive, the former entrance to the drive-in.
Above address is incorrect. Approx. address for this drive-in was 4213 Montgomery Drive. Shadow Ln. was the entrance.
The Summerfield address above is where the Summerfield/Lakeview theatre (which opened before the drive-in closed) is located.
Opps … Uploaded Thumbnail by mistake have added the full sided Image.
Summerfield road right across from Howarth Park (which was part of Spring Lake). Found it on Google. Tennis courts and parking lot are still there. Amazing. :–)
You can view some pictures from the 50’s of this theater at http://www.cinematour.com/tour/us/10879.html
This drive in was located across the street from the main entrance to Spring Lake. It was owned by Redwood Theaters in Novato, CA during the time I worked for Coddingtown Theaters from 1981-1983. Since this was a “sister” theater to Coddingtown, I was asked to help during inventory at the Village Drive In. I also spent many memorable hours enjoying the movies that were played there and hanging out with my co-workers in the lobby. I distinctly remember the day it was demolished. I believe it was in 1983. I have a newspaper clipping of it somewhere in a box. If I remember correctly, the manager was there that day watching. Can’t forget this theater!
Drive-Ins.com gives the address of the Village Drive-In as 6695 Coddington, Santa Rosa, CA 95405. However, there is apparently no street called Coddington in Santa Rosa, though there is a shopping center called Coddingtown Mall. I’ve been unable to track down the name of the street the drive-in was actually on.
In any case, the drive-in’s zip code should be changed to 95405. Giving Google Maps the wrong zip code has sent this theater to Stockton, a hundred miles from its actual location.
The Village Drive-In was built for the Redwood Theatres circuit in 1952. The concession area, rest rooms, and projection booth were located at the rear of the lot, giving the projectors a throw of 530 feet. The building was of modern rustic design, with brick, stone, and rough-sawn redwood on the exterior, and a split shake roof.
Interiors featured wood panelling and exposed wooden beams. The lot was surrounded by an eight foot high redwood fence in a basket weave pattern. Boxoffice Magazine published a two-page article about the Village Drive-In in its issue of January 3, 1953. The architect for the project was San Francisco theater designer Gale Santocono.
The operator of the Village in 1963 was Affiliated Theaters.