The Town Crier: First time at the Wink (part two)

Published 8:15 am Saturday, May 10, 2025

From the time I toddled, my parents took me to the movies with them, and at that time the Wink was the one and only movie palace in town. I’m a big movie fan so I guess you could say that was my window when it came to seeing things from around the world for the first time.

Last time, I remembered seeing perhaps my first film, “Mysterious Island,” before I was even 2 years old. With giant honeybees that sealed people up in waxy combs, it was mindblowing imagery that my little mind got blown with.

I saw spy movies during the heyday of 007 mania, and not just the Bond films. I also tagged along with my folks for the “Our Man Flint” films and the Matt Helm movies starring Dean Martin. I saw Dean-o in “The Silencers” when I was 6, and when it came to spy gadgets it was the first time I saw a gun that shot backward. That way if the bad guys got the drop on Helm and tried to shoot him, they were the ones that would be ventilated. And in a double switch-a-roo, Stella Stevens, Helm’s beautiful assistant, ends up with the gun facing a bad guy. She feigns being so distraught that she’s going to shoot herself. Those bad guys sure get surprised a lot.

As a young kid I didn’t watch many Western TV shows even though then they were plentiful. I was busy playing with toys. But we did go see Westerns at the Wink on the big screen. And the big star on the big screen was John Wayne.

In the ’60s and ’70s I saw at least 10 of his films at the Wink. I saw a few others at other theaters during those years, but “The Duke’s” home in Dalton was downtown.

With two exceptions they were all Westerns: “El Dorado,” “Rio Lobo,” “The Undefeated,” “Big Jake” and his last film, “The Shootist.” One of the Westerns was “True Grit” and it really made an impression on me when I was 9.

The first time I saw Wayne was at the Wink, and when I went and saw “The Shootist” when I was a teenager, it would be the last time I saw a new film of his. If you haven’t seen it, it’s considered by many (including me) the best swan song in movie history.

In Wayne’s non-Western “Hatari,” which came out when I was very young, I saw Africa for the first time. In this film about hunters that trap animals for zoos, I saw men riding in jeeps with long poles and nooses on the ends to capture wild beasts. And I saw a rocket-launched net that flew up and over a tree to capture birds. It was thrilling.

And in his film “The Hellfighters,” he played real-life hero Red Adair, an expert that goes around the world putting out oil well fires. Thanks to the movies I was seeing incredible sights from around the world.

Things on the screen weren’t the only items I was seeing for the first time at the Wink. Don’t forget the concession stand. I’m pretty sure that’s the first time I saw and enjoyed Raisinets, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, Milk Duds and Junior Mints. But there was one other item I had never seen before, but I only got once. They had a glass barrel filled with giant(!) dill pickles. If you ordered them they would pull it out with tongs and slip it in a paper sleeve. The rumor was the pickles are why they closed the balcony down because kids would throw the pickles from there during the movies. I can neither confirm nor deny.

At age 18 my dream came true and I got a job for Carmike Cinemas at the Plaza Twin (long gone). Since I worked for the company I could go see movies for free. On a trip to the Wink I got to tour the theater in areas I had never been. I saw many things for the first time.

In the projection booth I got to see two old movie projectors. They used to thread up a reel of the movie (about 10 minutes worth) and then when the film ended on one projector they switched it immediately over to the other. The light wasn’t from a bulb on these but rather carbon arc lamps. There were two carbon rods that lit up when electricity passed between them, like a welder’s arc. I noticed there were solid panels above all windows in the booth. These were left over from the old days when film was highly flammable. They were to drop down in case of fire.

Then the projectionist giving me the tour took me to a side door which led to a different set of stairs up to the balcony. Along the way there was a little room with a counter. And when we got to the balcony I saw something I had never noticed before, the balcony was in two sections. There was a low wall between the front section and the rear section and you could only get to the back section by coming up those side stairs.

These mysterious parts of the theater were left over from history before my time. The side stairs with the door that opened to the alley was the “Blacks Only” entrance from segregation days. The little counter upstairs was the separate concession stand for them, and the back of the balcony was the only place Dalton’s African Americans could sit back in the ’40s and ’50s. This was the first overt evidence I had ever seen in real life from the age of segregation. And I saw it for the first time at the Wink.

Mark Hannah is a Dalton native who works in the film and video industry.