LAMESA, Texas — The Sky-Vue drive-in theater in Lamesa permanently closed back in 2015 after a devastating fire. Everything regarding the theater has since been moved off the property.
However, one local group is beginning to make the effort to preserve the theater and relocate it somewhere new.
"The Friends of Sky-Vue" met today at Lamesa's Chamber of Commerce to bounce ideas off of each other about preserving the drive-in, but also took the time to swap stories about the various memories they had of the drive-in.
“We had personal stories about how important it is for families in this community to have a drive-in," Nancy Noret Moore, a former co-owner of Sky-Vue, said. "Back when they met their husband there and the many stories of how they snuck in, you know, all of us had sneaked in to the drive-in stories.”
There were more than just stories told, however.
One attendant, Mike Roy, gave the group plenty of ideas that could help the group in the long run.
Those ideas, however, were realistic as well, considering how much work will have to go into getting the theater back up and running.
“He's encouraging us to build the snack bar back and he's encouraging us to have more funds available because it's gonna' cost a lot more than we think,” Moore said.
Fundraising is just one of the issues that needed to be tackled, but Moore and her group had a few ideas regarding that.
“I have thought that there's so many bands and talents around that," Moore said. "Perhaps some of these bands might have a free concert so that we could raise big money fast to put maybe the fence up that we're going to need to put a fence up.”
It has happened in the past as well, as artists such as Lamesa have had acts such as Buddy Holly and John Denver pay a visit before.
To bring acts down to Lamesa to begin fundraising, as well as tackling the mountain of hurdles that seem to be in their way, Roy also suggested The Friends of the Sky-Vue create an official board.
While a board wasn't created after the meeting, the group's spirits remained high in their quest to preserve the iconic theater so that the younger generation could share their own stories someday.
“Were going to start communicating with each other. We have our names; we wrote down our names and telephone numbers," Moore said. We're going to text, and we're going to start becoming a coherent circle with us that are here tonight.”