INTEGRATING KAISER MOTORS WITH WILLYS MOTORS:

As mentioned in the 1955 testimony by Edgar Kaiser, initially when Kaiser purchased the Willys-Overlands assets, Kaiser Industries operated it as a separate automotive company called Willys Motors, an entity distinct from the other automotive company Kaiser Motors. Part of the reason for this was that both organizations had separate plants, Kaiser in Michigan (at Willow Run) and Willys in Toledo, and separate sales and distribution systems.

Step one of the integration was to blend the sales and marketing teams of Kaiser and Willys. Later, in early 1954, the Willow plant was shut down and manufacturing was moved to Toledo. By early 1955, most of the integration of Kaiser Motors into Willys Motors had been complete (I don’t know if Kaiser motors existed after that).

As a part of the integration strategy, and perhaps to bring cars, jeeps and truck under one umbrella logo, the marketing team introduced the Kaiser Willys name and the KW logo. These appear on a variety of brochures and documents from 1954, but pretty much disappear by early 1955. Here’s an example of the sales and dealers’ newspaper, the Kaiser Willys News. It features both the logo and the dual name:

But by early 1955, this KW and Kaiser disappears, replaced by just Willys and the W logo:

Maury found this good example of Kaiser Willys coupled with the KW on a service manual. It also labels the sales division as the Kaiser Willys Sales Division.

In terms of brochures, here’s an early 1954 version of a CJ-3B brochure with the KW:

Here are the later 1954 versions of this same brochure, with the one on the left intended for the Willys-Overland Export Company, while the one on the right was marketed by the Willys Motors, Inc. Gone is KW and Kaiser Willys, though Willys and the W-O logo reappear on the Export brochure:

Willys-Overland Export brochure is on the left, while the standard brochure for Willys Motors is on the right.

Here’s another somewhat common brochure that I hadn’t dated until yesterday. That’s because it didn’t register with me that this brochure has both a KW logo and a KW-form number (KW-1706). It’s the Farm Power Brochure that extolled the virtues of four wheel drive and it’s practicality on the farm. I’ll just show the first and last images here. The full brochure can be seen in the post below.

There are quite a few examples of the KW and Kaiser Willys logos on documents. However, by 1955, those logos were mostly removed in favor of ‘Jeep’ and Willys.

Tomorrow, we’ll visit the initial attempts to harmonize sales brochures across models.

(This is an extension of the hubcap post above, but also covers how the angular W was used in other ways)

In 1952, Willys-Overland introduced the Aero line of cars. They sported a new hubcap that featured only the W, along with a W on the front of the car and Willys script along the side.

The hubcap would be used throughout the Aero car line for the next four years.

Note that this May 03, 1952, ad from the Evening post includes the Jeep logo and the new angled W logo for marketing purposes. The anglular W logo would end up on the front of Aeros, on the covers of a variety of documents as well, such as parts catalogs.

The 1952 Mechanic’s Manual below shows how the W logo was used on covers.

1952 Manual with the W logo on it.

This page is from a 1952 owner’s manual; it demonstrates that the Willys-Overland Export Company had already been formed by 1952, so it was a pre-Kaiser creation.

Here’s a good shot of the angular W on the grille on they 1952 Aero Ace. Note the Willys script logo along the passenger side fender.

In 1954, I’m sure just to make my life documenting hubcap history more difficult, Willys introduced a new hubcap with a circle around the W on the Willys Aero Ace. What other models may have sported this hubcap I couldn’t say:

Also, in 1954, Willys offered a dual concentric circle hubcap, a design used later on the  Surreys (Galas) starting in 1959. However, these were all red. The one below looks like it could have been an aero cap:

1954 Aero Eagle

In 1955, Willys Motors introduced the Willys Bermuda, which sported a brand new hubcap design:

The Aero cars were discontinued in 1955, with some (or all) tooling eventually shipped to Brazil. The angular W logo would mostly disappear after 1955, but a few ripples remained. For example, the plain W re-appeared on the DJ-3A hub caps starting in 1956,

Close up of an early DJ-3A hubcap.

Sometime after 1959, with the introduction of the DJ-3A Surreys (and Gala’s for export), Willys re-introduced the concentric circle W hubcap design:

I doubt that this is a complete list of Willys-related hubcaps or of the angular W, so I welcome corrections for those that know more about this than I do!

This 32-page snow plow manual includes a variety of jeep-related photos.

View all the information on eBay

“Here I have an Excellent Condition 32-Page Brochure
MEYER SNOW PLOWS SNOW PLOWING MANUAL
Measures about 8 ½ x 5 ½ inches
Near Mint condition except it has 2 holes punched to fit in a ring notebook
Has some great photos inside of 1950s vehicles
including several Willys Jeeps”