Skyway Drive-In
Highway 8 and Lake Avenue Drive,
Stoney Creek,
ON
L8G
Highway 8 and Lake Avenue Drive,
Stoney Creek,
ON
L8G
1 person
favorited this theater
The Skyway Drive-in opened on July 11, 1946 and closed in October 1975.
Famous Players owned this drive-in which was the first to be built in Canada and had space for 705 cars.
Contributed by
Chad Irish
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Recent comments (view all 14 comments)
I grew up less than a mile from it, just around the corner on Mountain Avenue North. I went to Saltfleet High School, which was right next door. It backed onto Collegiate Avenue School, an elementary school. You could watch movies from the playground, or hop the fence and sit at the back; there were always unused speakers abounding. It was, as far as I can tell, the only ‘urban’ drive-in, anywhere. That is, there was housing abutting the property, so if you lived in one of these homes, you could probably see the screen quite well. Free films, indeed.
A few years ago I wrote a screenplay inspired by the Skyway. Entitled ‘Someone Else’s Dream’, its story is predicated on the idea that a ten year old’s family moves to this very neighbourhood and at the end of a very tear-filled moving day, the kid looks out his bedroom window…to find that he’s staring out at this enormous drive-in screen, lit up brilliantly against a deepening dusk sky. The Skyway had a huge effect on me growing up (obviously!); I have many great memories of the place, it’s no wonder they ended up prompting a need to turn them into a story. (The gist of the screenplay is the request in her will of his British grandmother to build the drive-in her husband had long dreamed of constructing in Cornwall; there’s never been a drive-in in England…)
As far as the ‘closing’ date, yes, RalphB is correct. It sure wasn’t 1970. Closer to ‘77, '78. I’m trying to nail this one down and will post when I’ve had some success.
Oh, by the way, a piece of trivia: the first film to be shown here, back in ‘46? 'Casanova Brown’, with Gary Cooper.
In 1956 it parked 695 cars and was owned by something called the F.P.C.C.
Thanks Mike.
This is indeed the first Drive-In built in Canada by Famous Players Canadian Corporation in 1946. The Canadian Drive-In in St. Catharines tries to claim this honor but it was not built until 1947. The last performance was a dusk-to-dawn show on the last weekend in October 1976 (I was working there that nite!) True note: When the houses were built nearby, several of them had posts with speakers put in their yards to compensate for the noise and traffic.
HEY DRIVE-IN GIRL You said it closed down because of the fact that Famous Players owned it. It closed down because it was no longer profitable as a drive-in property. Please do not attack the proud company FAMOUS PLAYERS CANADIAN CORPORATION, LIMITED. We were proud to belong to this wonderful organization that completely dominated movie theatres in Canada in the last century!!
Closed in 1975. The site is now Fiesta Mall.
Boxoffice of April 30, 1955 reported that Famous Players' Skyway Drive-In at Stoney Creek would be the first in Canada to be equipped to show CinemaScope movies. The new screen being installed at that time would be 100 feet wide and 45 feet high.
Closed in October 1975 with “A Clockwork Orange”, “Judge Roy Bean”,“The Terminal Man” and Deliverence"
Grand opening ad
Closed in October 1975 for the Fiesta Mall in which Famous Players opened a cinema there.