Daily Archives: November 24, 2025

Screen Towers: The Drive-In Theater in America

Screen Towers: The Drive-In Theater in America
By Steve Fitch, with an introduction by Katherine Ware (photography curator and artist)
Hardcover, 136 pages, $45

Reviewed by Steve Spiegel

I’ve been obsessed with drive-in movie theaters for as long as I can remember. The first movie I ever watched at a drive-in was Chitty Chitty Bang Bang in 1968 at a long-forgotten theater in Cincinnati, Ohio. I was five and watching that film from the comfort of our family’s Chevy station wagon, backed in with the rear door flipped open, which let me lie down with my blanket and pillow. This was the beginning of my love affair with drive-in theaters. I’ve been so obsessed that when eBay was a brand-new site, my very first purchase was a vintage drive-in movie speaker! (Yes, I still have it.)

American Sign Museum: Celebrating 25 Years

American Sign Museum: Celebrating 25 Years
By Text: Sam Roberts, Photography: Natalie Grilli, Design)
American Sign Museum, 2025
Hardcover & Softcover, 168 pages, Hardcover $84, Softcover $42

Reviewed by Josh Silber

A “Great Sign” will greet you as you arrive at the American Sign Museum (ASM) in Cincinnati. Anyone of a certain age will undoubtedly recognize the iconic totem that once stood out front of so many Holiday Inn hotels in America from 1954 to 1982. And while the Holiday Inn sign remains universally recognizable even after all these years, shockingly, the one outside the ASM is believed to be the “last authentic original” in existence. The surprising history of this Great Sign is just a small bit of the overall story of signage chronicled in a new book, American Sign Museum: Celebrating 25 Years, recently published by the American Sign Museum.