Wow. Just …. Wow. Within 24 hours of the Mahoning Drive-In Theater posting their cry for help, after learning that their home for the last 72 years, was in peril, the help came in support from around the county. It seems that Greenskies Clean Energy was not completely informed of the situation and once they did, getting and seeing all the comments from the drive-in community, they backed out of the deal, not wanting to shut down what was obviously a successful business. So major kudos to Greenskies for doing the right thing and showing their own support.

News started to spread quickly yesterday that the Mahoning Drive-In, located in Lehighton, PA, recently found out that the land they are located on has been optioned to Greenskies Clean Energy LLC, a solar company that plans to tear down the drive-in theater, which has been there since 1949, and use the land for a solar farm. Now, I’m all up for clean living, but there has to be other places to put one of these instead of on this thriving drive-in that has been running for close to 75 years, and has been creating lasting memories for generations of movie fans.

That above quote is from the legendary author Isaac Asimov, known to be one of the “Big Three” science fiction writers. But this post isn’t about science fiction, or about writing. It’s about education. Now, the word education can have a few meanings but for my purpose today, it about the act of learning.

The above quote is just as powerful about the horror genre as it is for any other subject. For me, it means never stop learning about the genre. Never stop watching different kinds of films. Never stop learning about those who are making them, or had made them. Doesn’t matter if we’re talking about a film that came out this year or one that from a 100 years ago, we need to invest our time to know more. It will not only open up more doors to different point of views and cultures, but it can possibly help you understand and see things that you already know a little differently.

I’m not sure why I haven’t posted about these earlier (Sorry Ian!), but over the last several months, I have been honored to be invited to participate in this podcast done by Ian Simmons, from Kicking the Seat, in which Ian is learning about the Italian giallo, but picking a new movie each month and discussing afterwards. Now before we go further, let me back up a bit. Mr. Simmons has been running his Kicking the Seat podcast since 2012, after starting his blog in 2009. You can quickly tell how much of a passionate film fan he is, and is always entertaining to listen to. You might not agree with him all the time, but that is the whole point to being a movie fan, discussing our different thoughts on the motion picture industry.

This last weekend, we drove over 500 miles to go to a drive-in to see movies that we have already seen.

Why?

Well, first of all, the question should be why not? But it really comes down to because of doing something out of the ordinary to have fun and spend time with friends and other like-minded monster fans.

Monster Bash usually has their convention in June, but that couldn’t happen because of the pandemic. Instead, they decided to hold Monster Bash: Under the Stars at the Riverside Drive-In, in Vandergrift, PA, where they screened 6 classic films from the ‘50s over two nights. Since we would have normally taken those days off from work, we decided we might as well use that vacation time and go out and have some fun. Especially when we heard that some other friends decided to do the same thing.