I’m updating the site tonight, so expect a few oddities and probably few posts this evening.

Thanks — Dave

A frustrated reader named ‘john doe’ emailed me tonight, leaving me an email with no return address.  ‘John’ was frustrated because many of the links related to vehicles for sale are no longer valid. ‘John’s’ frustration with this issue isn’t unreasonable; however, I keep the content for my purposes and for historical purposes (sometimes comments are attached to them for example).

To better answer ‘John’, and to remind readers, here is what I put in the FAQ section:

Craigslist Ads expire at different rates depending on where the ad is located.  In many cases, Ads are repeated.  In some cases, they aren’t re-listed even though the jeep remains for sale. So, I always err on the side of ‘for sale’ unless contacted by someone or unless the ad is deleted by the author.

The overall goal is to get a sense of how these old flat fenders are priced so that both buyers and sellers have a better sense of their local and national market.

Finally, in some cases these jeeps provided a teaching tool to show others something unique or unusual about the jeep.

So, to get the most out of this site, you are best off reviewing it every day or every other day to see what’s been added.

In addition, if you are looking for a particular jeep in a particular area and the search tool isn’t helping, just contact me (d@ewillys.com) and I’ll be happy to help you.

What I won’t be doing is deleting old content simply because it is old, though I do delete various posts when I think they no longer meets my needs.

What I would be willing to do is pay someone to build a better search tool so that posts can be searched by dates.  However, to do that I’d have to raise some money from readers, as I don’t have the experience to build that plugin.  If there’s an interest in this feature, and thus an interest in having me add a donation button to pay programmers to improve the site, then I’m open to that option.

Thanks,

– Dave

UPDATE: **SOLD** Was $3500.

This jeep looks good.  It appears to have an updated motor of some type as I think I see a header coming down on the passenger side.  It doesn’t look like there’s a muffler attached to the header.

“I have a 1946 Jeep Willys that was left to me by my father. Unfortuntley, due to the present economy I can no longer store it. It was last restored in the late 80s. Its a great project for a serious car lover. I would also be willing to trade for something of similiar value. Perhaps an older bronco. I request serious inquires only due to the fact of sentimental value that it holds.”

Randy passed on this slide show to me.  There are a few jeeps, but mostly airplanes.  I thought the shots were amazing.

http://picasaweb.google.com/7thfighter/IwoJima?authkey=Gv1sRgCIW06db_6oth&feat=email#slideshow/5299163150448181842

UPDATE: (01/29/09) I wanted to thank Gary Wolf, the writer of the article, for responding to my email to him.  He told me he has forwarded the correction to the editors of Wired.

Yes, I read the same thing and about choked on my dinner. That statement was published in Wired Magazine’s most recent issue, February of 2010 page 29. (and yes, the writer of the story got a note from me)

In his effort to defend his theory that the internet was pretty dead in terms of launching new, wildly successful companies, Peter Thiel, co-founder of Pay-pal and the first investor in Face Book (yes, he’s done well financially, which in Silicon Valley turns you into a soothsayer — yes, I used to work there …  ) used the history of the automobile as an example of how all booming industries support fewer and fewer wildly successful startups over time.

Now, I’m not quibbling with his general argument, but he seriously undermines his credibility with one of the biggest inaccuracies regarding the Jeep that I think I’ve seen published.  To quote him accurately, he states “But the last successful car company started in the US was Jeep in 1941.” …. yeah … right.

I mean, it’s not like he’s off by a year or something; instead he’s wildly off the mark in multiple directions.  For starters, American Austin (called Bantam later) was launched in 1929, Willys Overland was originally called Overland and launched in 1903, and Ford was launched in 1903.  Secondly, no one company build the early jeeps.  In addition, no company was called Jeep until 1962 when Kaiser became Kaiser-Jeep.  We could even get picky, such as Bantam built the first jeep in 1940 rather than 1941.  And, I’m sure we could go on, but I think the point is made.

No need to login to view the submenus .. but I guess that temporary plan didn’t work anyway … fortunately I have no ego wrapped in my coding abilities!

Actually, I thought my logging in idea had worked for users, until a reader pointed out that he still couldn’t see the sub menus even after logging in (thanks Robert!).  It was then I  discovered that I was the only person that could see the submenus …. cool for me but sucks for everyone else 🙁

So, after spending the day beating my head against my desk for several hours, injecting caffeine, and playing basketball … and it was a good day for bball … I finally found the culprit (some javascript related to the slideshow in the sidebar).  So, for the time being there won’t be a slideshow of past posts, but there will be submenus.

Updates later (and I’ll answer some emails which i have ignored all day to track down this problem).

– Dave