Jeep has spent 70 years influencing car buyers and has created a niche for itself in the off-roading vehicle market. It is an iconic brand with a history rooted in military service that has expanded sufficiently to include the civilian, 4×4 consumer as its target purchaser. Jeep is a truly American company currently focused on providing fuel-efficient and functional vehicles for active lifestyles in typically rugged fashion.

 

Jeep is known for producing the Wrangler, which got its start in the U.S. Army during WWII and has evolved to a four-door Unlimited iteration. Along with this popular model, Jeep also produces mid-size SUV’s and crossover vehicles all linked by the same familiar styling and versatility capable of going anywhere and doing anything.
 

Currently, Jeep is sitting nicely at the top of the auto industry in popularity and sales. According to Auto Trends Magazine, Jeep’s owner, the Chrysler Group, experienced a 27 percent increase in sales for October 2011. Sales of Jeep rose 25 percent with help from demand for the Compass, one of its crossover SUV’s, and from record-breaking Wrangler sales. This may be explained in part from the recent acquisition of Chrysler by the Italian car maker Fiat, since confidence in and sales of Chrysler were lacking of late.

 

Jeep continues to influence the auto industry with its innovations in trail-rated technology that have made it a leader in its class. The future of this legendary brand looks to be one of continued growth. The Chrysler Group has announced that it plans on spending $1.7 billion on the brand with most of that amount being spent to develop and produce the next generation SUV in 2013.

 

Jeep is a brand of American automobiles that is a marque of Chrysler Group LLC, a multinationalautomobile manufacturer in a global strategic alliance with Fiat.[2] The former Chrysler Corporation acquired the Jeep brand, along with the remaining assets of its owner American Motors, in 1987. Jeep's line of vehicles consists solely of sport utility vehicles and off-road vehicles but has also included pickup trucks in the past.

 

The first Willys MB Jeeps were produced in 1941[1] with the first civilian models in 1945,[3] making it the oldest off-road vehicle and sport utility vehicle (SUV) brand. It inspired a number of other light utility vehicles, such as the Land Rover[4][5] which is the second oldest four-wheel-drive brand. The original Jeep vehicle that first appeared as the prototype Bantam BRC became the primary light four-wheel-drive vehicle of the United States Armyand Allies during World War II, as well as the postwar period. Many Jeep variants serving similar military and civilian roles have since been created in other nations.

 

Development

Origin of the name

There are many explanations of the origin of the word jeep, all of which have proven difficult to verify. The most widely-held theory is that the military designation of GP begat the term Jeep and holds that the vehicle bore the designation GP (for Government Purposes or General Purpose), which was phonetically slurred into the word jeep, in the same way that the contemporary HMMWV (for High-Mobility Multi-purpose Wheeled Vehicle) has become known as the humvee.

 

An alternative view launched by R. Lee Ermey, on his television series Mail Call, disputes this, saying that the vehicle was designed for specific duties, and was never referred to as "General Purpose" and it is highly unlikely that the average jeep-driving GI would have been familiar with this designation. The Ford GPW abbreviation actually meant G for government use, P to designate its 80-inch (2,000 mm) wheelbase and W to indicate its Willys-Overland designed engine. Ermey suggests that soldiers at the time were so impressed with the new vehicles that they informally named it after Eugene the Jeep, a character in the Popeye cartoons created by E. C. Segar. Eugene the Jeep was Popeye's "jungle pet" and was "small, able to move between dimensions and could solve seemingly impossible problems."

 

Words of the Fighting Forces by Clinton A. Sanders, a dictionary of military slang, published in 1942, in the library at The Pentagon gives this definition:

 

Jeep: A four-wheel drive vehicle of one-half- to one-and-one-half-ton capacity for reconnaissance or other army duty. A term applied to the bantam-cars, and occasionally to other motor vehicles (U.S.A.) in the Air Corps, the Link Trainer; in the armored forces, the ½-ton command vehicle. Also referred to as "any small plane, helicopter, or gadget."

 

This definition is supported by the use of the term "jeep carrier" to refer to the Navy's small escort carriers.
 

Early in 1941, Willys-Overland demonstrated the vehicle's off-road capability by having it drive up the steps of the United States Capitol, driven by Willys test driver Irving "Red" Haussman, who had recently heard soldiers at Fort Holabird calling it a "jeep." When asked by syndicated columnist Katherine Hillyer for the Washington Daily News (or by a bystander, according to another account) what it was called, Irving answered, "It's a jeep."

 

Katherine Hillyer's article was published nationally on February 20, 1941, and included a picture of the vehicle with the caption:

 

LAWMAKERS TAKE A RIDE- With Senator Meade, of New York, at the wheel, and Representative Thomas, of New Jersey, sitting beside him, one of the Army's new scout cars, known as "jeeps" or "quads", climbs up the Capitol steps in a demonstration yesterday. Soldiers in the rear seat for gunners were unperturbed.
 

Although the term was also military slang for vehicles that were untried or untested, this exposure caused all other jeep references to fade, leaving the 4x4 with the name.

 

Trade name

A trademark brand-name application was filed in February 1943 by Willys-Overland.[7] As the only company that continually produced Jeep vehicles after the war, Willys-Overland was granted the privilege of owning the name "Jeep" as a registered trademark in June 1950.

 

It is also used as a generic term with a lowercase (jeep) for vehicles inspired by the Jeep that are suitable for use on rough terrain.

 

Bantam Reconnaissance Car

When it became obvious that the United States was eventually going to become involved in the war raging in Europe, the U.S. Army contacted 135 companies asking for working prototypes of a four-wheel-drive reconnaissance car. Only two companies responded to the request, The American Bantam Car Company and Willys-Overland. The Army had set what seemed like an impossible deadline of 49 days to supply a working prototype. Willys asked for more time but were refused. The bankrupt American Bantam Car Company had no engineering staff left on the payroll and solicited Karl Probst, a talented freelance designer from Detroit. After turning down Bantam's initial request, Probst responded to an Army request and commenced work, initially without salary, on July 17, 1940.

 

Probst laid out full plans for the Bantam prototype, known as the BRC or Bantam Reconnaissance Car, in just two days, working up a cost estimate the next. Bantam's bid was submitted complete with blueprints on July 22.[9] While much of the vehicle could be assembled from off-the-shelf automotive parts, custom four-wheel drivetrain components were to be supplied by Spicer. The hand-built prototype was completed in Butler, Pennsylvania,[10] and driven to Camp Holabird, Maryland, for Army testing September 21st. The vehicle met all the Army's criteria except its engine torque requirements.

 

Ford Pygmy and Willys MB

The Army felt that the Bantam company was too small to supply the number of vehicles it needed, so it supplied the Bantam design to Willys and Ford who were encouraged to make their own changes and modifications. The resulting Ford "Pygmy" and Willys "Quad" prototypes looked very similar to the Bantam BRC (Bantam Reconnaissance Car) prototype and Spicer supplied very similar four-wheel drivetrain components to all three manufacturers.

 

Fifteen hundred of each of the three models were built and extensively field-tested. Willys-Overland's chief engineer Delmar "Barney" Roos made design changes to meet a revised weight specification (a maximum of 1,275 lb (578 kg)[12] including oil and water). He was thus able to use the powerful but comparatively heavy Willys "Go Devil" engine, and win the initial production contract. The Willys version of the car would become the standardized jeep design, designated the model MB and was built at their plant in Toledo, Ohio. The familiar pressed metal Jeep grille was actually a Ford design feature and incorporated into the final design by the Army.
 

Since the War Department required a large number of vehicles to be manufactured in a relatively short time, Willys-Overland granted the United States Government a non-exclusive license to allow another company to manufacture vehicles using Willys' specifications. The Army chose Ford as the second supplier, but building Jeeps to the Willys' design. Willys supplied Ford with a complete set of plans and specifications. American Bantam, the creators of the first Jeep, spent the rest of the war building heavy-duty trailers for the Army.

 

World War II Jeeps

Final production version Jeeps built by Willys-Overland were the Model MB, while those built by Ford were the Model GPW (G=government vehicle, P designated the 80" wheelbase, and W = the Willys engine design). There were subtle differences between the two. The versions produced by Ford had every component (including bolt heads) marked with an "F". Willys also followed the Ford pattern by stamping its name into some body parts, but stopped this in 1942. The cost per vehicle trended upwards as the war continued from the price under the first contract from Willys at US$648.74 (Ford's was $782.59 per unit).[15]Willys-Overland and Ford, under the direction of Charles E. Sorensen (Vice-President of Ford during World War II), produced about 640,000 Jeeps towards the war effort, which accounted for approximately 18% of all the wheeled military vehicles built in the U.S. during the war.

 

Jeeps were used by every service of the U.S. military. An average of 145 were supplied to every Army infantry regiment. Jeeps were used for many purposes including cable laying, saw milling, as firefighting pumpers, field ambulances, tractors and, with suitable wheels, would even run on railway tracks. An amphibious jeep, the model GPA, or "seep" (Sea Jeep) was built for Ford in modest numbers but it could not be considered a huge success—it was neither a good off-road vehicle nor a good boat. As part of the war effort, nearly 30% of all Jeep production was supplied to the United Kingdom and to the SovietRed Army.

 

The German military also liked the Jeeps. Many officers used captured Jeeps as transportation, and in late 1944 refused to surrender them despite being needed for Otto Skorzeny's Operation Greif.

 

Postwar military Jeeps

The Jeep has been widely imitated around the world, including in France by Delahaye and by Hotchkiss et Cie (after 1954, Hotchkiss manufactured Jeeps under license from Willys), and in Japan by Mitsubishi Motors and Toyota. The utilitarian good looks of the original Jeep have been hailed by industrial designers and museum curators alike. The Museum of Modern Art described the Jeep as a masterpiece of functionalist design, and has periodically exhibited the Jeep as part of its collection.[18][19]Ernie Pyle called the Jeep, along with the Coleman G.I. Pocket Stove, "the two most important pieces of noncombat equipment ever developed."[20] Jeeps became even more famous following the war, as they became available on the surplus market. Some ads claimed to offer "Jeeps still in the factory crate." This legend persisted for decades, despite the fact that Jeeps were never shipped from the factory in crates.

 

Another legend—true, in this case—rising around the Jeep comes from the Jeepney, a unique type of taxi or bus created in the Philippines. The first Jeepneys were military-surplus MB and GPWs, left behind in the war-ravaged country following World War II and Filipino independence. Jeepneys were built from Jeeps by lengthening and widening the rear "tub" of the vehicle, allowing more passengers to ride. Over the years, Jeepneys have become the most ubiquitous symbol of the modern Philippines, even as they have been decorated in more elaborate and flamboyant styles by their owners.

 

In the United States military, the jeep has been supplanted by a number of vehicles (e.g. Ford's M151 MUTT) of which the latest is the Humvee.

 

The CJ-V35/U

After WWII, Jeep began to experiment with new designs in the jeep including a model that could drive underwater. On February 1, 1950, contract N8ss-2660 was approved for 1,000 units “especially adapted for general reconnaissance or command communications” and “constructed for short period underwater operation such as encountered in landing and fording operations." The engine was modified with a snorkel system so that the engine could properly breathe underwater. 

 

Jeep M715

In 1965, Jeep developed the M715 1.25-ton army truck, a militarized version of the civilian J-series Jeep truck, which served extensively in the Vietnam War. It had heavier full-floating axles and a foldable vertical flat windshield. Today, it serves other countries, and is still being produced by Kia under license.

 

The CJ ("Civilian Jeep") series began in 1945 with the CJ-2A followed by the CJ-3B in 1953. These early Jeeps are commonly referred to as "flatfenders" because their front fenders were flat across the front, the same as their military precedents, the Willys MB and identical Ford GPW models. The CJ-4 exists only as a 1951 prototype, and is the "missing" link between the flat-fendered CJ-2A and CJ-3B and the round-fenderedCJ-5 first introduced in 1955.

 

The Jeep brand

The brand has gone through many owners, starting with Willys, which produced the first Civilian Jeep (CJ) in 1945 and who were the first granted the trademark in 1950. Willys was sold to Kaiser Motors in 1953, which became Kaiser-Jeep in 1963. American Motors Corporation (AMC) purchased Kaiser's money-losing Jeep operations in 1970. The utility vehicles complemented AMC's passenger car business by sharing components, achieving volume efficiencies, as well as capitalizing on Jeep's international and government markets.

 

The French automaker Renault began investing in AMC in 1979. However, by 1987, the automobile markets had changed and even Renault itself was experiencing financial troubles. At the same time, Chrysler Corporation wanted to capture the Jeep brand, as well as other assets of AMC. Chrysler bought out AMC in 1987, shortly after the Jeep CJ-7 was replaced with the AMC-designed Jeep Wrangler or YJ. Chrysler merged with Daimler-Benz in 1998 to form DaimlerChrysler. DaimlerChrysler eventually sold most of their interest in Chrysler to a private equity company in 2007. Chrysler and the Jeep division now operate under the name Chrysler Group LLC.

 

Jeeps have been built under licence by various manufacturers around the world including Mahindra in India, EBRO in Spain, and several in South America. Mitsubishi built more than 30 different Jeep models in Japan between 1953 and 1998. Most of them were based on the CJ-3B model of the original Willys-Kaiser design.
 

Toledo, Ohio has been the headquarters of the Jeep marque since its inception, and the city has always been proud of this heritage. Although no longer produced in the same Toledo Complex as the World War II originals, two streets in the vicinity of the old plant are named Willys Parkway and Jeep Parkway.

 

American Motors set up the first automobile-manufacturing joint venture in the People's Republic of China on January 15, 1984. The result was Beijing Jeep Corporation, Ltd., in partnership with Beijing Automobile Industry Corporation, to produce the Jeep Cherokee (XJ) in Beijing. Manufacture continued after Chrysler's buyout of AMC. This joint venture is now part of DaimlerChrysler and DaimlerChrysler China Invest Corporation. The original 1984 XJ model was updated and called the "Jeep 2500" toward the end of its production that ended after 2005.

 

A division of Chrysler Group LLC, the most recent successor company to the Jeep brand, now holds trademark status on the name "Jeep" and the distinctive 7-slot front grille design. The original 9-slot grille associated with all World War II jeeps was designed by Ford for their GPW, and because it weighed less than the original "Slat Grille" of Willys (an arrangement of flat bars), was incorporated into the "standardized jeep" design.

 

AM General

The history of the HMMWV (Humvee) has ties with Jeep. In 1971, Jeep's Defense and Government Products Division was turned into AM General, a wholly owned subsidiary of American Motors Corporation, which also owned Jeep. In 1979, while still owned by American Motors, AM General began the first steps toward designing the Humvee. AM General also continued manufacturing the two-wheel-drive DJ, which Jeep created in 1953.
 

The General Motors Hummer and Chrysler Jeep have been waging battle in U.S. courts over the right to use seven slots in their respective radiator grills. Chrysler Jeep claims it has the exclusive rights to use the seven vertical slits since it is the sole remaining assignee of the various companies since Willys gave their postwar jeeps seven slots instead of Ford's nine-slot design for the Jeep.