In the summer of 1952, 11-year-old Tom Brzezinski screened old black-and-white movies for the neighborhood on a white bedsheet strung between two trees in his family's backyard. Nearly 65 years later, the West Friendship man known as “Mr. B” is still at it.

Since 1971, Brzezinski has served as host and curator of the Columbia Association's free movie nights on Mondays and Fridays each summer.

“I have always been fascinated by film,” said Brzezinski, who is 76 and grew up in Catonsville. He retired as a Howard County teacher and media specialist in 2006 after 41 years, but still works as a substitute teacher.

“Movies can take you to worlds you will never get to experience otherwise,” he said.

The movie buff estimates he has selected and shown more than 1,000 films for the association over the decades, introducing each one with movie trivia or fun facts. Audience members approach him before most showings to tell him they remember a movie he screened when they were young.

“It makes me tingle inside to know how much the audience enjoys outdoor films,” he said.

Brzezinski is excited by this season's offerings at Lake Kittamaqundi, which will end the weekend after Labor Day with showings of two 2016 Disney films. “Zootopia,” an animated movie released in March, will be screened Sept. 9; “The Jungle Book,” a live-action film that opened in April, will be shown Sept. 10. Other coming titles include “Ant-Man” and “The Martian.”

“Each year, Mr. B prides himself on getting the latest releases to show at the lakefront,” said Michelle Miller, director of community services for the association. “The passion and knowledge [he] has about movies are one reason the Columbia community has truly embraced the free films Columbia Association hosts every year as part of the Lakefront Summer Festival.”

Indeed, film factors into most of Brzezinski's interests.

As a board member of the Columbia Film Society, which was founded in 1968 and provides a grant for the association screenings, he helps curate a series of art-house films that are shown to 1,100 subscribers from September to May at Howard Community College.

And on a recent Ocean City vacation, he watched nine films in four days, he said, noting that “nothing was as great as I was hoping it might be.”

Despite his love of film, he does not have a favorite movie, says Brzezinski, who liked to tell his students they could call him “Mr.?B” but they would still have to learn to pronounce and spell his last name.

He launched his teaching career in 1965 at Waterloo Elementary, then in 1968 helped open Bryant Woods Elementary in Columbia. The next summer, he began showing films in a nearby park — on a bedsheet, once again — as his gift to the community.

“I used a card table to set up my projector and paid to rent the movies myself,” he said. People would watch on both sides of the makeshift screen, not minding if the credits appeared in reverse.

By 1971, the Columbia Association had invited him to show his free movies in a mowed field at the lakefront. The site eventually became the home of the Rouse Co. headquarters and is now occupied by Whole Fields and Haven on the Lake.

While he is passionate about film, his first love has always been taking a multimedia approach to teaching.

Word of his way of reaching kids by tying the curriculum to films eventually spread across the county, he said, and in 1978 he was offered the new position of media specialist at Clemens Crossing Elementary, which he held until he retired.

Depending on the weather and the title, the Columbia Association movie nights can draw 100 to 1,000 people to the lakefront lawn near the People Tree, Brzezinski said.

The biggest attraction was Disney's “Frozen,” a 2013 Academy Award-winning animated film that drew 1,000 spectators two years ago, he said.

“If you haven't heard the main song, ‘Let It Go,' it's what ‘Tomorrow' was to ‘Annie,'?” Brzezinski said. During the showing, he turned the volume down so the audience could belt out the tune.

Nowadays, he and his wife, Carol, often go to the movies, though he acknowledges that he's the driving force behind those excursions. The couple have two grown daughters, Kelly and Sarah, and it is Sarah who most shares his enthusiasm for films and invites him to see Broadway plays.

As for next summer, Brzezinski is thinking about bringing back two classics.

“You can't go wrong with ‘ET' or ‘The Princess Bride,'?” he said.