In a romance and adventure worthy of the big screen, a Pennsylvania couple is preserving the past and forging a future as the owners of the world’s oldest drive-in movie theater.

Lauren McChesney got more than admission to a double feature when she handed her ticket to Matt McClanahan at a different drive-in he managed in 2018. They started dating a year later, and, in August, got engaged. In between, they purchased Shankweiler’s Drive-In, which was Pennsylvania’s first drive-in and only the nation’s second when it opened in 1934.

The couple began brainstorming about drive-ins during a cross-country road trip that included stops at both operational and abandoned theaters. Their original goal was to open a new drive-in, but when they learned Shankweiler's might get sold to developers, “the light bulb went off,” McClanahan said.

“Why are we spending so much time trying to build one when there’s one literally down the road from our house that’s for sale and is like the most important drive-in?” he said.

AP Video shot by Mingson Lau and Gene Puskar