by Guest » Mon Jun 26, 2017 2:58 am
In 78 I was a sophomore at Fresno High and the cool thing to do was to cruise down Belmont on a Friday or Saturday night. It was like the TV show Happy Days or American Graffiti but Belmont had a drive - in called Mars. Mostly a lot of innocent fun, boy meets girl, show off your new car or hot rod, where's the party?
People have been cruising up and down Belmont from Abby to the Roedding park Circle since the 1950s. Back then there where no islands in the middle of the street and you could get close to one another. Some nights we would just kick back on a bench at a bus stop and check out the girls. Cops started showing up on their motorcycles, it was easier for them to get in-between the cars and see what you were doing. Lots of fond memories, but by 1980 the violence got worse. A lot worse.
The cops really started cracking down.I remember on foggy nights you could hear gunshots and people were getting stabbed. The cholos and the Cholas weren't afraid of anyone or anything. In fact it seemed like the cops were afraid to pull them over. So people stop going. Some tried cruising on Blackstone but that didn't last long. The low riders cruised Kings Canyon, but none of it was like Belmont. And like the drive - in theaters it was gone forever. What a shame.
In 78 I was a sophomore at Fresno High and the cool thing to do was to cruise down Belmont on a Friday or Saturday night. It was like the TV show Happy Days or American Graffiti but Belmont had a drive - in called Mars. Mostly a lot of innocent fun, boy meets girl, show off your new car or hot rod, where's the party?
People have been cruising up and down Belmont from Abby to the Roedding park Circle since the 1950s. Back then there where no islands in the middle of the street and you could get close to one another. Some nights we would just kick back on a bench at a bus stop and check out the girls. Cops started showing up on their motorcycles, it was easier for them to get in-between the cars and see what you were doing. Lots of fond memories, but by 1980 the violence got worse. A lot worse.
The cops really started cracking down.I remember on foggy nights you could hear gunshots and people were getting stabbed. The cholos and the Cholas weren't afraid of anyone or anything. In fact it seemed like the cops were afraid to pull them over. So people stop going. Some tried cruising on Blackstone but that didn't last long. The low riders cruised Kings Canyon, but none of it was like Belmont. And like the drive - in theaters it was gone forever. What a shame.