 “From day one, this place has had rumors of closing,” says Vickie Hardy, co-owner of Haar’s Drive-In movie theater in Dillsburg. “From March of ’03, every summer, the rumor was, ‘This is the last year, this is the last year, this is the last year’ – every year.”
Standing in Haar’s dimly lit projection room, Hardy optimistically downplays yet another set of rumors (rumors that, this time, she and her family conjured) that the drive-in will close its gates for good at the end of its 57th season in September.
Hardy’s grandfather, Vance Haar, opened Haar’s Drive-In in 1953. A traveling auctioneer during the 1940s, Haar finally rooted his auction business in a plot of Dillsburg farmland in the early 1950s. Though the auction was his bread and butter, Haar had a penchant for the entertainment business and built two movie theaters on the same grounds as his auction – an indoor theater and the drive-in.
“His dream was to have circuses and that type of thing here,” says Hardy. “We used to have merry-go-rounds and a little train and we had what we called a trolly train. He loved to entertain people.”
Twenty years after the nation’s first drive-in theater was opened in New Jersey in 1933 (the second opened in Orefield, PA), the outdoor movie alternative had reached the height of its popularity with about 4,000 theaters nationwide. Haar’s enjoyed enough success to sustain operation seven days a week, year round. “It was very popular at that time,” says Hardy. “[Admission] was a quarter and Thursday nights they would have dollar-a-carload. So, of course, everybody would pile as many as they could into the car.”
The drive-in also featured a 50-cushioned-seat section in the concession building where patrons could enjoy movies during the winter months, as well as heated car-side speakers on poles at each parking space.
In 1972, Vance Haar passed away, leaving the auction and drive-in businesses to his four children – George, Boyd, Elwood and Claribel. The four ran their father’s ventures until 2003, at which point they sold the land and complex to the Ahold Corporation (which owns the nearby Giant supermarket) and semi-retired. However, closing the drive-in was not to be. Claribel’s daughters Vickie and Connie (along with their husbands, Doug Hardy and Al Darbrow) and their cousin Sandra Haar worked out a deal to lease the land and keep their grandfather’s dream alive.
Haar’s is now open only three nights a week – Friday, Saturday and Sunday – but the drive-in, which can accommodate more than 500 cars, still shows a family-friendly (G, PG and PG-13 movies only) double feature each night at sundown. Patrons can see two newly released films in the comfort of their own car for only $7 per adult and $2 per child – considerably less than they’d pay to see one film in an indoor theater.
Though Hardy and company have upgraded various elements of the drive-in, including the projector and FM radio sound system, remnants of the drive-in Vance Haar built 56 years ago are still visible. An old playground sits just to the left of the theater’s original entrance, which led cars to and from route 15 down a pair of roads split by now faded and crooked vertical light posts. The original “now playing” sign still sits along route 15, but the addition of pavement and dividers to the highway 40 years ago forced Haar’s entrance to Siddonsburg Road.
Even that which is helplessly vintage, including the concession building and the speakerless poles at each parking space, add to the drive-in’s classic aura. The vintage that has been artificially added, including the American Graffiti soundtrack prior to the movies and intermission countdown reel (complete with the dancing hot dog), completes the experience.
According to the United Drive-In Theater Owners Association, Haar’s is one of only 383 drive-ins still operating in the United States and one of only 34 in Pennsylvania – the most of any state. Twenty-two of those Pennsylvania theaters are west of Altoona, congregating in areas around Erie, Pittsburgh and State College. Six more exist in Northeastern PA areas like Hazleton and Scranton, while an additional five are scattered an hour north and west of Harrisburg. But after Lancaster’s Columbia Drive-In closed in 2005, Haar’s was left standing as Central PA’s last bastion of a bygone era in cinema. For now.
“This year, we did anticipate only running through July,” says Hardy. “Last year’s economy did affect us. So now we’re gonna see how it affects us this year. We will readdress everything at the end of the season and then we’ll decide.” In addition to general economic woes, high gasoline prices deterred many customers (some of whom come from as far away as Maryland and Virginia) from making the trip to Haar’s last year.
When asked if there is any one thing that could save Haar’s from closure, Hardy takes a long pause before replying, smilingly knowingly but also hesitant to divulge specifics. While she and her family do make a profit off the drive-in, that profit is dwindling to the point where the operation may cease being profitable. “Let’s just say that at this point in time, we’re doing everything possible to keep it open,” says Hardy. “And a lot of it is dependent upon our sales.”
Raising ticket prices is not an option, however. Not only does the $7 ticket price draw in the majority of Haar’s business (including sell-outs for popular movies on weekends with nice weather), but a sizeable chunk of ticket revenue goes to the movie studios as commission. “If we raise the ticket prices, the only ones that are gonna really benefit are the movie makers,” says Hardy, who declined to reveal what percentage they pay out. Additionally, when Haar’s gets more popular movies, the studio gets a higher cut, but the theater needs better movies to draw a better crowd, but the better movies cost more money … And so on.
So if ticket sales aren’t the answer, what is? What can save the drive-in? The answer is both simple and obvious: popcorn.
“[People] are coming out, but one of the things we’ve been noticing is they’re bringing more of their own food,” explains Hardy. “That’s where we hurt. We need to make it in the restaurant in order to continue on.”
Haar’s concession building offers a wide variety of food, snacks, drinks and desserts at extremely low prices. Nevertheless, the theater makes more money from $1.25 sodas and $3 cheeseburgers than it does from ticket sales. Other menu selections include $1.80 hot dogs, $3.50 pork barbecue sandwiches, $4 nachos, $4 large popcorns and $4.50 ice cream sundaes – all of which, Hardy assures, are made with high-end ingredients.
If patrons leave their ham sandwiches and canned sodas at home and take advantage of the low ticket prices by passing the savings on to the concession stand, they could help save the last of a dying American institution.
Buy concessions. Save the drive-in. No concept could be more fitting for Hardy, who remembers falling asleep as a child beneath the snack bar’s knotty pine counters. She later helped her uncle Elwood clean the ice cream machine and eventually served ice cream herself. Today, it’s those sundaes that will make or break the business.
Just outside of the projection room, two of Hardy’s younger grandchildren play hide and seek amongst those same pine counters, ducking behind popcorn machines and soda fountains with tiny little giggles. Hardy hopes that one day a fifth generation will carry on her grandfather’s legacy.
“That would be cool,” she says with a smile. “Our oldest grandson said, ‘When I’m 18, grandma, I’m gonna take over.’ I said, ‘Go right ahead!’” And with any luck (and a healthy portion of popcorn), when he does take over, he’ll never have to address those nagging rumors.
Haar’s Drive-In, located at 185 Logan Road in Dillsburg, is open Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights through September. The box office opens at 6:30 p.m. with the first movie beginning at dusk (around 9 p.m.). For more info, call 432-3011 or visit www.haars.com/drive-in.htm. |
