Comedian Victor Borge didn’t find anything funny about his purchase of a Jeep fire engine. He has a poultry farm to protect! This article was published in the April 1956 issue of Willys News.
Old News Articles Research Archives
Jeeps Working Hard on Texas Ranches
1956 Article about Desert Rat
This June 1956 photo from Willys News shows Harry Oliver delivering the Desert Rat Scrapbook newspaper. It turns out the Desert Rat has quite a history!
Mosquito Control Purchases Willys
At the time of this photo the American Mosquito Control Association owned more than 3000 jeeps, making it one of the biggest jeep customers.
Clyde Beatty’s Safari Wagon
This article from the May 1955 issue of Willys News shares the story of Clyde Beatty and his ‘Safari Car’. You can learn all about the famous Clyde Beatty on Wikipedia.
Clyde Beatty also purchased a special car from Willys in 1951:
Need Scaffolding for your Jeep?
You’ll never find this unique piece of Willys equipment in a Special Equipment Catalog. It was featured in the May 1955 issue of Willys News. It has some type of geared pulley system for raising and lowering the scaffolding. OSHA approved? I wonder how many scaffolds they produced and sold . . .
1944 Photo of First Jeep to enter Slovenia
This Acme Newspicture photo shows the first jeep and trailer to enter Slovenia. A soldier demonstrates the field technique for lifting a trailer with a railroad tie so his buddy can change a flat tire. I do not have an exact date this was published, but it can be seen at the fulton history site.
1943 Photos of Ford GPA Tests
These photos were published in the Philadelphia Inquirer in July 27, 1943. In the top pic it looks like the driver jumped this off the end of a dock.
10,000 Vets Seek to Buy 1,588 Jeeps
In June of 1946, around 10,000 Veterans appeared at the Benicia armory in the hope of buying one of the 1,588 WWII jeeps for sale. The article was published in the June 25, 1946, issue of the Utica Daily Press (pg3).
DJ-3A Dispatcher Newspaper Ad
Here’s a DJ-3A Dispatcher Ad from January 6,1956, published in the Herald Statesmen in Yonkers, NY. If you lived in Elmira, New York, you’d have seen the same ad, but with a price that was over $200 more ($1583)! Carmel, New York, had the best price at $1249.
This ad was published six years later in a 1962 issue of the Herald Statesman.















