Skyview Drive-In, Belleville, Illinois

Tonight the theater has attracted a full house, or lot rather. Rows of cars of all sizes, makes and models are parked with their occupants inside watching an over-size screen with rapt attention. Above the sounds of the movie being streamed over the FM radio station, the laughter of children, the murmurs of adults, the crackle of wrappers being opened and the nocturnal cacophony of crickets provide a quiet soundtrack. It’s just another night at the Skyview Drive-In in Belleville, Illinois.

Skyview has been a fixture of Belleville, a town about 45 minutes outside of St. Louis, since the late 1940s, said Steve Bloomer, a co-owner of the theater and the third generation of his family to work there.