Wally Cohn and Brooks Stevens weren't the only two men who took a stab at restyling the Willys MB Jeep that proved so capable in World War II. In fact, as we see from a recent reader submission and some research, it was a rather popular activity during and immediately after the war.

Of these restyled Jeeps, we can safely divide them into two distinct sub-groupings. The first, those modified during the war, were done mostly to increase the rider's comfort. Such is the case with the Jeep that Ed Witos of Fords, New Jersey, was assigned when he was stationed in Germany with the Yankee Division of the 101st Infantry Regiment. Ed wrote:

I drove the commander of the 101st while we were fighting in the European theater. During that time we experienced cold, rain, snow, and whatever. With the help of the mechanics in our unit we modified the fenders as you can see from the photo I attached. It helped in preventing muddy, cold faces at times when driving. Next we modified or made wind deflectors using material from a damaged fighter plane.

With the end of the war, Ed turned the Jeep in at Frankfurt, never to see it again. Others had similar ideas: Turning to Crismon, we see photos of another couple Jeeps fitted with extended fenders to keep the elements at bay.

Read the Whole Article