The eight-page Jeep News Volume 12 Number 1 kicked off 1966 with the news that sales increased 23% and, surprising to me, special equipment sales jumped almost 42%. Given the increase in Wagoneers and Gladiator sales, I would think the special equipment numbers would be falling, as I thought a shift was happening away from the notion of utility vehicles in favor of “fun” and family vehicles. I’d be curious to know what was driving those equipment sales.
Page two is mostly dealer news, while page three continues a page-one discussion of the anti-skid, safely and traction capabilities of the Wagoneer and Gladiator jeeps. Page four highlights the use of larger magazine images.
Page five goes international and includes an article about Mrs. Welthy H. Fisher, an 85-year-old literacy advocate, who raised funds for a Wagoneer-turned-traveling-library, which she used to deliver books to folks in India as part of a function of Literacy Village, a program she launched at age 73. From her photo, I’d never guess she was 85.
Page six features Sinclair Oil’s Wagoneer, which traveled with a touring exhibit featuring a flatbed trailer with nine large animatronic dinosaurs. I wonder whatever happened to those dinosaurs. Here is a pic of them floating down the Hudson River circa 1964:
Page seven reported on the unexpected 4WD display at a Florida Airstream gathering of almost 1500 trailers. Mud had forced many of the trailers to be towed into the site via tractor, but the fact that Florida Outdoorsman John Wilhelm had a Wagoneer capable of puling his trailer into the site without issue seems to have spurred interest in his jeep. Page eight highlights the use of jeeps in Detroit Mine, something covered by Jeep News previously and other sources.
