Status: The restored Douglas marquee is in Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn.

Update: The Douglas Auto Theater in Kalamazoo is obviously closed. Only a screen in deperate need of repair remains. (Jeff Raterink 1/31/00)

Update: The huge curved screen remains, as does the driveway, and the marquee pedestal. Several apparently abandoned moving vans now reside in this drive-in graveyard. The snack bar is gone. (Michiagndriveins.com 8/13/00)

Update: Noticed earlier this year that the screen is now gone. (Dave 7/15/04)

Update: Completely gone, no marquee stand, no screen. (Kyle Smith 8/22/04)

History: Kalamazoo's first drive-in, the Kalamzoo Auto Theatre was opened on July 8th, 1948 by Albert Ochs. The Kalamazoo Auto used a screen tower design identical to the Muskegon Auto Theatre and the Saginaw Auto Theatre. The Kalamazoo Auto was renamed and became the Portage Drive-In Theatre on March 31st, 1955. Across town, Ochs opened Kalamzoo's second drive-in, Douglas Auto Theatre shortly thereafter on April 14th, 1955. Both the Portage, and Douglas, were sold to Butterfield Theatres in 1961. The Portage was closed in 1983 and the property was developed. The Douglas closed and abandoned in 1985. The marquee was fortunately saved and restored by the Henry Ford Museum, and is currently on display. But, the snack bar and screen were left to decay for years. The snack bar was demolished in the mid 90's, and the big curved steel screen tower and concrete marquee pedestal finally came down in 2004. (Michigandriveins.com 5-29-05)

Update: All trace of the Douglas Auto Theatre is now gone. A new cargo distributing company called "IDS Distributing" now occupies the front half of the property, about where the marquee once stood. The back half still looks vacant, however. I am not sure if the company owns it or not. It was built in late 2005, but I just discovered your website recently. (TB 10/15/06)

Update: I used work here back in the summer of 1983. I was what they called a rampman, I checked the speakers to see if they worked. Made sure no one sneeked in and sweeped and mopped the snack bar. It was neat but sad to see the pictures, still it brought back good memories of my long ago youth. (Quentin Kutrich 02/28/07)

Related Links:
Kalamazoo Drive-In Theatres - 1948-1985 (J.P. Jenks/Vanishedkalamazoo.com)
Requiem for a Cool Drive-In (Eric Lorey/Vanishedkalamazoo.com)