So, I’m doing my best to avoid going out to my parents very cold, damp garage to finish fixing my mom’s car.  Of course, the internet is one of the best avoidance tools ever invented.

FLAT FENDER BABES:
On a lark, I typed in ‘Flat Fender Babes’ into google just to see if anything came up.  While most of the links were garbage, one link lead me to a list of significant production automobiles, created by Angry Stan at AngryStan’s blog.  Naturally, one of the vehicles listed was the Willys MB.  What was interesting about the MB’s inclusion was Stan’s comment that the MB was “very loosely based on the Austin 7”.

Whoa .. news to me.  What you talkin’ ’bout Stan?

Now, I already knew that Austin had built four wheel drive vehicles such as the Austin Champ and Austin Gypsy in the 1950’s, but I didn’t know about the long history between Austin and the military.

You know what this means?  It means I now had a perfect garage avoidance project!

GRANDFATHER OF THE JEEP?
A quick search yielded the following bit of information:

“GRANDFATHER OF THE JEEP. An interesting historical note is the role these cars [Austin 7] played in the development of the jeep. The American Bantam Company was formed from the American Austin company, which was set up to produce Austin 7’s and derivatives of them in USA under license. Bantam used them in the 1930’s to develop military cross country scout cars, which led to their jeep prototypes. The Austin 7 Military Tourer can honestly claim to be the original jeep prototype, predating the Bantam and the Ford GP.“

Also, the British military was using the austin 7 throughout the 1930’s as an excellent cross country vehicle.

Thus, it may be argued that based on Bantam’s British and American military experience, it’s entirely logical that Bantam would be the first to develop the jeep prototype. But wait, it gets better ….

BRITISH INVENT FOUR WHEEL DRIVE AUSTIN?
Hmm .. I didn’t see this coming.  As part of my research I stumbled upon a very extensive history on the interrelationships between Austin and Bantam, Bantam and the QMC, Bantam and Willys and more at allpar.com.  Moreover, in 1937, according to the allpar Bantam History,

“a British infantry captain used the Austin chassis and parts to build a small, light vehicle with four wheel drive. It was about 70 inches long, 37 inches wide, and weighed around 1,000 pounds. Those “specials” were given tough jobs to fulfill, with machine gun and small artillery mountings. They were given exceptional ratings and rave reviews from the British infantry.”

Meanwhile, Bantam had hired a lobbyist familiar with what the British were doing to lobby the QMC for a lighweight recon vehicle.  At some point, Bantam loaned the QMC several different vehicles to test.  One big draw back was the lack of four wheel drive.  However, the lobbyist was aware of the British 4wd experiment, so the lobbyist worked with the QMC to draft some specs which, not coincidentally, matched the short-wheel base typical of the Bantam vehicles (in other words, the fix was in) …

BANTAM AND WILLYS RELATIONSHIP
Another interesting fact is that the owner of Bantam, Roy Evans, who bought the bankrupt American Austin and renamed it American Bantam, also owned a majority share of Willys-Overland, which he purchased in 1935.  Evan’s was one of the largest Willys dealers even as he ran Bantam.

THE BLITZ BUGGY
The last little bit of trivia included in the Allpar history is the code name for the first BRC, “The Blitz Buggy”

So, read the all-par history for an interesting take on how Bantam really developed the jeep.

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Ok, enough fun.  Time to head out to the garage and put together the remaining pieces of mom’s car (I spent yesterday transfering all the parts and pieces from her old car door to the replacement one).