A Smattering Of Forward Control Goodness

So, the tenth annual FC Roundup took place last week in Phoenix, Arizona and as well Dave Eilers fromeWillys took a trip to the event this year and saw alot of amazing stuff that he shared on his site. I had fun reading it all this week and the various amazing sights he and his wife saw on their way. I’m dealing with a few family health issues this week and what I thought that what was to be a fairly long post today needs to turn into a fairly short and simple one. So since I’ve been sitting on these miscellaneous FC brochures and press pics for awhile I thought that they would work for today as well.

Hope that you enjoy them and check them out in the FC Across The Web album as well as here in the Dealer Item section. Come back next week and I’ll hopefully have something longer. Enjoy your Easter Sunday!

A Short Tribute To Bill Mauldin And The Jeep

Because it feels as if Mother Nature is playing jokes on us in the Northeast with winter dragging on and on I needed to laugh today and one of the best ways to find someone to commiserate with is to look at the hapless duo of Willie and Joe of Bill Mauldin’s cartoons. As a kid, I stumbled across a few of his cartoons and they struck a chord with me somehow. They belonged to a then, not forgotten or far away world, the America of the 1940’s. While their full meanings were just out of touch for a ten or so year old boy who loved playing with plastic toy soldiers, tanks and yes, jeeps even then, I looked up to these men and women of the past. Mauldin’s was a form of story telling that I knew was special. If grown ups even then could enjoy cartoons that told them something important then Mauldin must have been doing something right. I’ve admired his work for some time now and I’ve wanted to write a short piece about him. And now seems to be the time to do it. This year marks the tenth year since we’ve lost him as well.
Finish reading the whole article here... 

Website Finds- The New York State Forest Rangers

Welcome back to the This-Old-Jeep.com Website Find section. Its getting pretty close to spring and spring for me means getting outside and hopefully out into the woods and ideally in a jeep! So today I bring to you a few vintage photographic finds online at the The New York State Forest Ranger site. Its a website created by a retired New York State Forest Ranger and dedicated to telling their history and something of their mission which since 1885 has been to serve and protect the enormous amount of woodland and forest in NYS. Having grown up in NY right next to the Adirondack State Park I’ve had a few interactions with the Rangers and they’ve all been positive. I’ve looked up to these men who are expected to patrol their area (or ANY area in New York) at any time of the day and in any weather on foot, bike, ATV, ski, snowshoe, plane and at one point, in this specially modified CJ2-A. I’ve never seen anything quite like this full wrap around brush guard, but it must have served its purpose as a defense against underbrush and boulder traversing a wide swath of uninhabited NYS forest. The Adirondacks, to me are as impressive as any mountains in the world and the sheer variety of things to do are really varied. Today only 134 Rangers are sworn in as gun toting law enforcement to cover primarily the Adirondack and Catskill State Parks, but they cover a total of 18.6 million acres of forested public and private land. They serve as law enforcement, first responders, rescuers and fire fighters (in fact they were first known as Fire Wardens). You can visit the official site here, but the unofficial site that we are concerned with today is chock full of history and information. My hat is off to you guys! Check out the album here.

I’ve been busy lately with prepping and updating a few big portions of This-Old-Jeep.com including the Dealer item section. Next week I plan on beginning adding a new and large treasure trove of dealer brochures that I’ve come across. I’m also working on the research for an article that was spurred on by a request for any info that I received from a reader. Hopefully that should be finished in the next couple of weeks. Come back next week for more!

The This-Old-Jeep.com 2013 Calendar- March

This month of March brings us the first day of spring, the return of Daylight Savings and my birthday and so, it has always held a special place in my heart. The two photos here today document a couple’s trip into what I was told by the seller was the high desert area of Montana, the Big Sky country. I’ve only passed through Montana and not spent a whole lot of time there unfortunately, but it does seem to be an awfully big  and beautiful place. And desert? In Montana? Yep, apparently, though this scene must have been somewhere on the outskirts, and on a ranch as you can see cattle in the background, but what a place for a jeep trip! I found this online on the actual presence of deserts in Montana: “Montana may be up near the Canadian border, but some of its landscapes look like they'd fit in just as well in southern Arizona. Pacific weather systems flowing in from the west tend to get ripped up by the mountains in the western third of the state. This means little rain makes it past the ranges, turning central and eastern Montana into semi-arid desert-type environments, including badland, dune and shrubland. Arctic cold fronts coming south from Canada don't bring in enoughmoisture, either; precipitation in much of central and eastern Montana averages less than 16 inches per year, with some areas getting as little as 6 inches.”

The couple took some time traveling through it in their CJ2-A and they look like they were having a great time and scoping something out with binoculars sitting on the hood. I chose this for March as it seems like a transitional time in the photo. The couples were still wearing jackets, but there is no snow in evidence. And you can plainly see the Montana license plate mounted on the windshield frame and as well I believe the registration sticker in the shape of Montana with a ‘1952’ as near as I can tell. And PS. ‘The Treasure State’ motto was used on license plates from 1950 to 1966.

Check out the rest of the This-Old-Jeep.com calendar here. It makes a great gift for yourself or any other lover of the jeep. Each month features a new and not previously seen photo or two. There’s still plenty of time to get it and enjoy another nine months of the history and lore of the jeep in people’s lives!

Come back next week. I have a couple of ideas for new articles that I’d like to write as well as plenty more to continue with what I’ve started detailing in the world of the jeep!

Website Finds, Florida Memory

On this snowy day in Maine with winter still dragging on it seems appropriate to take a look at a website that Dave from eWillys has turned me onto, Florida Memory. Its a website set up in conjunction with the state of Florida and covers a wide variety of subjects detailing life in Florida and the South in general. It hosts a ton of info for everyone from teachers to amateur historians and genealogists. You can find old historical documents, videos and photos ranging from the state’s history, civil rights, the state’s economy and tourism, culture, business, folklore and sports. Florida is one of those places that usually sets a definite image in your mind when you think of it, beaches, oranges and older retiree folks. But its much more than that and this site proves it. But of course, what brings it to my attention this day is its sampling of rare, never before seen jeep related photos ranging from the late WW2 era to modern day. Its really a neat place to cruise around (the site AND the state...) and the site contains a number of unexpected hits for jeeps in photos!

Check all of them out here in the new old website finds album and click here to see a few of my favorites.

Hardtops And The Civilianization Of The Jeep, Part One

Recently I’ve been fascinated with one of the many facets of the jeep, hardtops and modifications. The jeep started out as simply a basic working vehicle, no frills and no extras were included. It was after all, required through the weight restrictions that the jeep needed to be designed and built under. But ever since the beginning of the jeep, men were impressed by its capabilities and design with a few exceptions. One of the biggest was the very fact that it was an open topped vehicle. Having just a canvas top without even doors or a heater available was great fun and acceptable if you were a GI stationed in the Pacific theater, but not so much fun if you were shivering through the winters in Europe. And so it isn’t surprising that from the jeep’s origins that men were modifying them with solid tops and custom bodywork. It seemed fitting that I show off some examples of Jeep hardtops and other attempts at ‘civilianizing’ the jeep a week after we were hit with a blizzard that dropped 32 inches of snow along with high winds. The MB gained a poor, but deserving rep of being cold, so much so that one its nicknames was the “Pneumonia Wagon.” In some cases the home brew hardtops were absolutely necessary, such as on Attu Island in the Aleutian Island chain.
You can read the rest of the article here.

The This-Old-Jeep.com 2013 Calendar- February

Its a cold morning here in Maine and so it seems perfect to show off the This-Old-Jeep.com 2013 calendar page for February. Its been an active winter for most of the country and we’re no exception. Apparently the winter of 1945 had its share of snow as well as the calendar page shows. An MB races off down a snowy country road in a perfect snow scene. Its idyllic, but with just the scant comfort of a canvas top, probably freezing cold too! Not sure where the photo was taken (though the photo came from a seller in Lancaster, Pennsylvania...). I’d like to think back in the States and a returned GI with a surplus MB, but who knows? that’s the charm of many a photo like this one. You can make up any story that you’d like to.

If you want to see more photos like this one and maybe make more mental stories, check out the This-Old-Jeep.com 2013 calendar which is available along with a ton of other jeep memorabilia from our online store right here.

Come back next week for more from This-Old-Jeep.com. I have alot of brochures to add to our dealer brochure section. I think that you’ll be pleasantly surprised by alot of what I have to show you!