Movies in the olden days...

My first memory of a movie was viewing "The Wizard of Oz"...the green faced witch made me scream and I wouldn't watch any more of the movie. I buried my face in my mother's lap. It must have been a re-release to catch the kiddy crowd, as I was born after it came out.

When I was a kid, growing up in Clarkston, WA, there was the Pix Theater, across the river in Lewiston, ID, was the Roxy Theater. We didn't hike across the river to see anything at the Roxy, unless it was something special. After driving the route recently, I'm amazed that Granny let us walk that far. But noting the sluggishness of today's youth, I imagine it was a good thing.

I remember that if a Roy Rogers movie was coming to the Pix, every kid in town planned to attend, at least the kids in my grade were. Roy was 'it' for us. His horse was beautiful and talented, the dog was great, but Dale could have been dropped. We all groaned if he gave her a kiss.

Later, living in Northeast, MD, yes..Northeast was the name of the town, movies were different. There were two-reelers, meaning they showed two features, and in between there were cartoons, and short pieces. Both my hubby and I love to watch the short pieces, the Pete Smith ones come to mind, which are shown sometimes on AMC.

The cost? Throw out a quarter and I was out of my parents hair for at least four or five hours on a Saturday afternoon.

One of my most terrifying moments, besides viewing the green witch, was a movie named, The Cat People, another re-release. In it, there was a large jungle cat killing people. Well, a mother sent her daughter to the store in the dark of evening, and the girl goes into the night as her mother locked the door behind her. Sure enough, the girl bought the item, and hears something behind her and she starts to run, dropping the item she purchased and then we're inside the house, and she's beating on the door, and screaming, and all the kids in the movie house were screaming as well, the mother is trying to unlock the door and then the screaming stops, then a pool of blood flows under the door. Very chilling.

As my friends and I left the theater, it was dark, which was unusual, as it was normally light when we exited. Anyhow, as we passed under a tree, we heard a noise, we looked up, saw something, and then we all screamed and ran hellbent for home. LOL