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Welcome to eWillys.com, a website for vintage jeep enthusiasts. I update this website nearly every day with jeep deals, jeep history, interesting reader projects, jeep related info, and more.
These quick searches can help you find things on eBay. People list in the wrong categories all the time, so don't be surprised to see brochures in the parts area for example.
The links to posts below show jeeps grouped by models, condition, and other ways. Some of these jeeps are for sale and others have been sold. If you are unsure whether a vehicle is still for sale or not, email me at d [at] ewillys.com for more info.
There are plenty of interesting, unusual, historic and surprising stories related to Jeeps and their owners. In addition, some of these features have nothing to do with jeeps. This link will display all featured stories starting from the latest.
Looking for parts and not sure where to go? There are a variety of large and small new and used parts sellers both online and offline.
Importantly, the allure of buying a project jeep can be romantic. The reality of restoring a jeep can be quite different, expensive and overwhelming without the right tools and resources. So, tread carefully when purchasing a "project". If you have any concerns about buying a vintage jeep, or run across a scam, feel free to contact me for help, comments or concerns .
Air Trails Hobbies was a ‘how to’ magazine that provided news, reports, designs, and ‘how to’s’ on a range of hobbies. It’s intellectual bent on science and design just makes it more odd that it’s overview of the Willys History seems so lacking, especially in the 4WD jeep department. Given that, by February 1955 (the date of the issue below) the CJ-5 was already introduced, it seems a bit odd to ignore the latest jeep!
Lots of fun articles in this April 1955 issue.
This May 14, 1951, article “Life Goes Ridgerunning” from Life Magazine used to be posted in full on the Yakima Ridge Runner’s website, but that site appears to be no longer active. So, you’ll find it below.
If you’ve never seen the color footage of the Ridge Runners jeeping in the Cascade Mountains, that’s worth a throwback look: http://www.ewillys.com/2011/03/29/2-more-videos-from-jpzombie-com/
And, there’s the widely circulated set of two videos that may have been filmed at the same time the writers of the magazine article were visiting Yakima (video 1 and video 2)
The June 1943 issue of Motor Magazine out of Buenos Aires, Argentina, featured this introduction to the jeep on its front page. I snagged this copy off of eBay in December and it finally arrived. The 24-page magazine printed on newspaper covers a wide range of automotive subjects, most far above my rudimentary Spanish. I’m pretty surprised any of these survived!
Here are the first two pages (the only two that included the jeep as far as I could tell):
Also included in the magazine was this ad(?) featuring a jeep.
This August 1955 article in Popular Mechanics includes 2 CJ-5s. It took a nuclear scientist to locate the article (long story), but it dove tails nicely off yesterday’s Willys News post that included an article on uranium mining (last page of Willys News) about these two prospectors.
iI’ve shared some of the pics and captions, but now I can take some okay scans (not great, just okay) of the full pages. This has the KW logo, the Kaiser Willys branding, and a mention of the Kaiser-Willys Dealers and Salesmen.
This photo and caption appeared in the October 1953 issue of Popular Science (page 124). There are several interesting things in this photo. First, this jeep is setup with right-hand-drive; second, the body has been cut similar to the way some of the DJ-3As would be trimmed on the sides; third, this vehicle is only two-wheel-drive. This is the earliest photo that I know showing an experimental mail jeep that, arguably, led to the DJ-3A Dispatcher/Delivery/Convertible production models. The picture, without the caption, can also be found on the CJ-3B page about mail jeeps.
This 600lb jeep-like vehicle was built by O.L. Munding of Glendale, California. It was included in the October 1953 issue of Popular Science (page 124). On the same page, the magazine also featured a rat rod vehicle built by Munding that was powered by two air-rolled Ranger engines, war surplus items originally used to start big bomber engines.
This ad was published in the August 1954 issue of Fortune Magazine. When Kaiser bought Willys, one of the early advertising decisions was to use the KW logo on various marketing documents. I suspect this was an attempt to brand across the jeep and Willys Aero lines. This strategy was dropped by 1955, followed shortly with the dropping of the Aero vehicles.
View all the information on eBay
TJ shared this wonderful illustration shared by the French company of Jeepstock.
I bought a wagoner literature combo off ebay that included the “Test the ‘Jeep’ Wagoneer” excerpt from an unknown issue of Trailer Life Magazine that also included the early Wagoneer brochure on the post below this one. There are still two sets of these available for purchased the last time I checked.
The writer, Bruce Grantland, concluded that the Wagoneer was a new type of vehicle for towing, better suited to towing long distances in remote areas better than any other vehicle of the time.
This article appeared in the July 1952 issue of Popular Science (pgs 79-82). This is article is interesting in that is covers some of the complaints GIs had about earlier jeeps and how the M-38A1 attempts to address those issues.
The February 1963 issue of Popular Mechanics included an article about the New Mexico Jeep Derby held annually in Truth or Consquences, New Mexico. It’s a great article about the early days of jeep racing. I’ve also included a video of one Derby race, but the quality is poor. Still, in some clips, you can see just how much the co-pilot shifts his body around the jeep.
View Popular Mechanics February 1963 at Google Books
I took a chance on eBay and bought a 1949 issue of the Goodyear’s Magazine for Men off of ebay that mentioned, in the ebay ad, about having an article on a Jeep Posse. The magazine turned out to be a sort-of marketing piece by Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company focused on men and with several interesting articles. Below you’ll find two articles from the magazine and a quiz.
The first article is a pretty early article on Utah’s Bountiful Jeep Posse. The other article covers a man named John Fordon and his business in New York City called “Beck ‘n Call”. Finally, the Fordon article includes a quiz on streets from around the country, names as relevant to day as they were back in 1949.
And now, the article on Fordon. Also, note the “Where are they” quiz.
The May 1967 issue of Popular Mechanics includes the article “Four-Wheel Safari Test In the Rugged Rockies”. The article covers a two-day test in the high mountains of Colorado from Telluride to Ouray. The main goal was to see if the Ford Bronco and/or the International Scout could compete with a V-6 equipped CJ-5. The conclusion was interesting.
I’ve found a May 1948 Outdoor Life article called “Jeep Pose Fights Fire & Flood”, but I can’t find a reasonable priced issue (one on eBay is $30 with shipping). If anyone happens to have that article or the magazine, I’d be interested in sharing the story.
Cover of the May 1948 issue of Outdoor Life with the Jeep Posse article.
This issue includes (from a worthpoint auction), “Jeep Posse Fights Fire & Flood”, ” Turkeys of the Tall Peaks” and ” This Happened to Me”. There is also a print suitable for framing titled ” The Battle with the Wolves” by Fred R. Zepp. There are to many vintage ads such as Champion Outboards, Remington, Dupont, Heddon, Dipsy Doodle Wood Manufacturing Co., True Temper The Rod of Champion, Calvert, and more to mention, there is a color ad for Old Thompson Brand Blended Whiskey on the back cover.
This Carbogram was published six times a year by the Holley Carburetor Company of Warren, Michigan. The below issue features the announcement that Willys would be using Holley’s 2300 Carb in conjunction with the new Tornado-OHC engine.
View all the information on eBay
The May 1953 issue of Popular Science including the following 2 jeep-related short blurbs:
Cold Alaska has so much warm water (from volcanic springs) that 17 new Jeep fire engines being sent there for civil-defense duty are equipped with special “heat exchangers.” They’ll cool the water sprayed on fires — cold water put out fires faster.
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The same issue also includes an unrelated mention of the new M-170:
Ed’s got this rare Salesbuilder for sale on eBay. He’s also got other Willys-Overland related items.
View all the information on eBay
UPDATE: **SOLD** Was $28.
Here’s a good price on some 1960s Four Wheeler magazines (currently $28.49 w/ free shipping). I’d buy the lot myself, but it appears I have all of them.
“All of these magazines have been 3-hole punched, previously stored in a binder. The magazines show to be used with edge and corner wear. Some of the covers exhibit crinkling and all of them show some degree of age wear. Several of the magazines have address labels. Some of the magazines are curled at the binding edge from being in a notebook binder for years. The insides look to be clean without markings.”
This vehicle, dubbed a “Super” Jeep, was featured on the cover of Mechanic Illustrated magazine in April of 1968. Unfortunately, the article provides very little information. Hopefully, this is still sitting in someones garage, somewhere.
There’s a post card of a jeep train from the Jungletown area of Africa USA on eBay. Also on this post, I’ve aggregated all the Africa USA images.
View all the information on eBay
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From 2015: Africa USA, was part of a theme-park movement in the late 1950s that included New York’s Freedomland, Disneyland, Wisconsin’s Fort Dells, and others. By 1959, these parks were collectively generating revenue of $2 billion.
There is a feature article about these parks in the August 1, 1960, issue of Life Magazine. The picture below is from that article. You can take a ‘virtual’ jeep-train tour of Africa USA here (don’t expect much). 
This article appeared in the December 1955 issue of Willys News. That’s the jeep train behind the animals.
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R. H. Carroll took the time to create a website displaying a wide array of off-road and dune buggy magazines. His plan included posting images of early Four Wheeler magazine covers, as seen here: http://99wspeedshop.com.s3-website-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/fourwheeler01.html (This helps me as I’m still looking for 1962 and 1963 Four Wheeler magazines).
This link shows you the Home page for the entire site. As you click through, you’ll begin to see that he spent a good amount of time creating this. Another neat feature are the timelines for the various magazine genres. Just the Go-Karts/Karting section alone is unique and interesting.
Below is one timeline example. Check out the Hot Rod/Street Rod/ Custom Magazine timeline here: http://99wspeedshop.com.s3-website-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/menu03.html
This handy timeline was published here: http://99wspeedshop.com.s3-website-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/menu04.html
This April of 1972 article in Boy’s Life Magazine tells the story of the Boys Scouts work project on the Naches Trail in the Cascade Mountains just north of Mt. Rainier in conjunction with the Pacific Northwest Four-Wheel-Drive Association. I was not there (that I remember), but our club, the Wandering Willys, including my father, was there to help ferry the Boy Scouts to the Naches Trail.
You can read the article online here
This story appeared in the August 12, 1950, issue of the Saturday Evening Post, page 56. It highlights the challenges of being an Army jeep driver.
