Hull's Drive In Theatre on Route 11 right outside of Lexington, Virginia

A major pop culture phenomenon began on June 6, 1933 — when a man named Richard Hollingshead sensed a good marketing opportunity. With the automobile increasingly reshaping the American landscape, he opened the nation’s first drive-in movie theater in Camden, New Jersey. Soon, drive-in movies became a fixture across the country and a popular place for teenage dating. Some even had heaters to go along with the speakers, so they could stay open through the winter.

Drive-ins reached their peak in the 1950s. At the time, there were nearly 21,000 movie theaters and more than 4,000 of them were drive-ins. Now, there are nearly 4,800 movie theaters around the country — most of them with multiple screens — while there are fewer than 300 drive-ins remaining in operation.