The Best Idea Yet - 🚙 Jeep: The Car That Saved The World | 4

Episode Date: November 5, 2024

The Jeep isn’t just a car, it’s a cult: inspiring clubs, meetups, even its own “Jeep Wave.” From cameos in M*A*S*H to Mean Girls, the Jeep’s been ranked the most patriotic brand in America for 20-straight years (sorry, Coke). But did you know that Jeep actually started as a group project? Learn how three fiercely competitive rivals came together for some emergency teamwork to help Allied Forces win WWII, how a freelance designer almost didn’t get the credit, and how its name was (maybe) inspired by a mythical character from Popeye. Jeep isn’t just the world’s most epic 4x4… it literally saved the world. Jump in Yetis, we’re going exploring… Find out why Jeep is the best idea yet.Follow The Best Idea Yet on the Wondery App or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to new episodes early and ad-free on Wondery+. Join Wondery+ in the Wondery App, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Start your free trial by visiting www.wondery.com/links/the-best-idea-yet/ now. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to the best idea yet early and ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Nick, you remember doing group projects in school? Jack, do I remember doing group projects in school? No better way to rely on someone else for doing a whole bunch of work over there. Like we did this one chemistry project on like electrolytes. And so I whipped up a whole board with like power rate and Gatorade, which were like kind of related to electrolytes. What'd you get for the grade?

I got a C plus, but that's besides the point, Jack, because as a piece of art, that group project was stunning. The earliest one I remember was in physics in high school. I like this. We had to prove that energy is neither created nor destroyed. It's only transferred. I think Newton had to deal with that same group project, Jack. What grade did you get on that physics group project? I'll tell you at the end of the show. Yeah, it is.

Jack and I didn't understand it at the time, but now we get why teachers absolutely torture kids with group projects. Because someday, those kids are going to be faced with a hard problem they've got to solve fast. Fast. And they're going to have to solve it with people they don't know or get along with. Hey, Jack, I think that's the plot of Lord of the Rings. It's also the plot of The Parent Trap. And it's the plot of The Fast and The Furiouses, all 48 of them.

We've got a name for this, actually. We do. It's called emergency teamwork. And the constraints it places on teams can actually lead to triumphant innovation. Great point. Like the subject of today's episode. A product created by not one, not two, but three different companies who are actually competitors of one another. And all while under incredible pressure of both resources and time.

Plus, a freelance inventor who designed it in less time than it takes to rewatch Suits. Wow. And what they created would help the Allies win the war, and then transform the American landscape for decades to come. Oh, those are some steaks, Jack. And besties, we're not talking about camo, and we don't mean the Manhattan Project. We're talking about the Jeep. The Jeep. If you want a second car and a vehicle for work around the house and one for hunting and fishing trips, mister, you want a universal Jeep. Jeep, the iconic all-wheel drive, all-terrain vehicle. It's part car, part truck, part dune buggy. Also, it's as much cult as it is car.

It's absolutely a cult, Jack. Jeep owners tend to be proud Jeep owners. They got community events, they got meetups, they got off-roading clubs. Nick, there's enough Jeep enthusiast websites to break a chassis. Jack, you see what I'm doing now? I'm doing the Jeep wave. Have you seen the Jeep wave? Jack, if one of our listeners is listening to this pod while driving the Jeep right now,

they have to legally pull over and do the Jeep wave back to me right now. Jeep became one of the Allied Forces' most powerful assets during World War II. And as a commercial vehicle, Jeep is one of those brands that feels like it's always punching above its weight class. It does. It claims less than 3% of the global market share for passenger cars, but the passion around Jeep can be seen in a different set of numbers. Get this. Jeep has been ranked the number one most patriotic brand in America for over 20 years running. That's out of every brand. It beats Levi's, Coca-Cola, Disney, even American Express. Oh, and those guys, American Express, they've got American in their name. Plus, they've become the essential summer transport of beach towns and Tommy Bahama

beach chairs across America. Yetis, this is the story of how Jeep went from the battlefield to the backyard, from 1940s newsreels to millennial music videos, and how a crisis can bring out the best of us if we work together. Jump in, Yetis. We're going exploring. Because the Jeep is the best idea yet. From Wonder and T-Boy, I'm Nick Martel. And I'm Jack Kravici-Kramer. And this is the best idea yet. The untold origin stories of the products you're obsessed with. And the bold risk-takers who brought them to life. I got that feeling again

Something familiar but new We got it coming to you I got that feeling again. Something familiar but new. We got it coming to you. I got that feeling again. They changed the game in one move. It's how they broke our world. Okay, besties. It's May 28, 1940. We're in Detroit in the Spartan offices of the president of General Martyrs. He's a

straight-backed Danish immigrant, age 61, named William Cygnus Knudsen. But he's 6'3", and a former boxer, so everyone calls him Big Bill. I mean, Jack, I'm picturing Liam Neeson with like a Viking hammer and a horned helmet. You're actually not far off. Okay, good, good, good. Big Bill's just going about his day, maybe checking his calendar, doing head of GM things when his phone rings. The voice on the other end is eerily familiar. Bill has heard this voice in dozens of radio addresses and fireside chats. It's President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and he wants to see Big Bill in Washington. America is probably headed to war. Hitler has already invaded France, and England's brand new prime minister, Winston Churchill,

is begging the United States for help. But FDR can't just wave his hand and mail Winnie Church some tanks, because production of weapons for war in America was basically dismantled after the end of World War I. As you said in the scene here, if the United States is going to step in again, a can-do attitude isn't going to be enough. We're going to need a serious plan to ramp up production of weapons and supplies on the verge of a Second World War. And this is why President Roosevelt has come to Bill Knudsen, head of General Motors, and not a cabinet member or something.

Remember, in World War I, it was private automakers like GM and Ford who did the manufacturing of the Army's war materials, everything from submarine chasers to cannons. So now that World War II is on the horizon, FDR names Bill Chairman of the Office of Production Management, or OPM, and then the head of wartime production. A lot of official-sounding titles that basically mean guys in charge of making war stuff. Right, yeah. And Knudsen hits the ground running. Oh, yeah.

He drafts a plan to get the country ready. And that plan, it runs right through Detroit. Soon, Packard Motors is making aircraft engines, and Chrysler is making tanks. Ford converts their Michigan factory from F-Series to fighter jets, from Model As to machine gun mounts. And one of the top items on the agenda, Nick? Oh, they need this car, see? One of the first agenda items on Big Bill's list

is picking up a project the U.S. Army has been struggling with for years. It's not a bomb or any kind of weapon. It's a car. I'm sorry, pause the pod for a sec, Jackie. I'm going to have to stop you right there. The army has been struggling with something as fundamental, as basic as a car. A car is putting it too simply. Okay. They've been trying to develop an all-purpose light vehicle with specs that seem basically impossible. This thing needs to be able to drive on all types of terrain. That includes beaches, you know, the place where invasions by sea start from. It also needs to be strong enough to transport over 600 pounds of soldiers and gear, including a machine gun,

but light enough to airdrop from an airplane. It needs to work for scouting and recon, refueling and re-upping of ammo, and communicating via radio. Oh, plus blackout lights to make it harder to spot at night. Extremely high standards. This is like Kate Hudson, how to lose a guy in 10 days. This is very Kate. I mean, they're basically trying to mash up a motorcycle, a horse, and a tank in a way that would make Bruce Wayne weep. But the research and development on this ATV, it hasn't been going great, has it, Jack? They've been auditioning everything from modified tractors to open-top sedans to something they call the belly flopper. It's like a small sled with big wheels and a machine gun mounted in the front.

But you can only drive it by laying face down on your belly. So, Jack, I'm adding all this up, and none of it adds up to a Batmobile. And by July 1940, time's basically up. Allied intelligence gets word that the Nazis are working on their own general purpose vehicle with Volkswagen. Now, yetis, we talk about arms races in business all the time, like the AI arms race or the processor chip arms race or the Spike Seltzer arms race. But this, this is a literal arms race between us and the Axis powers to develop a do anything, go everywhere military supercar. So the U.S. Army puts out the call to every American automaker. We're taking proposals.

Build us a Batmobile motorcycle horse thing. You got 11 days. They've got 11 days to pull this off. Nick, Hitler is about to conquer England. So yeah, do the project and do it quickly. 11 days to pitch the design and 49 more to deliver a working prototype. It's like a hackathon with machine guns and I'm kind of getting stressed out hearing about it, Jack. And crazy timeline or no, automakers are highly incentivized to give this a try the u.s army is about as big a client as it comes yeah it's huge this is going to be a gigantic contract for hundreds of thousands of units oh and jack not to mention the brand exposure of making a vehicle that takes down hitler so the call goes out from an office of the army called the Army Quartermaster Corp to 135 US automakers. And now, Bessies, we should sprinkle on more context here.

135 automakers. Forget the big three. This was the big 135. This was pre-auto industry consolidation. So it wasn't just Ford, GM, and Chrysler. Back then, you also had American Bantam out of Butler, Pennsylvania. Jack, you had Checker Motors out of Kalamazoo. You had Willie's Overland out of Toledo. It goes on and on and on. There were so many car brands back then. All of these companies have a chance to land what could be the biggest contract of their lives. So they start scrambling to put their best engineers on the job.

Jack, sounds like we're now getting a different kind of arms race, the race for top talent. Because when it comes to hiring, sometimes you're in a buyer's market, but sometimes you are in a seller's market. But you are never in more of a seller's market for talent than on the cutting edge of a growing industry. Right. If your company is working on something brand new that only like five engineers in the world know how to do, then guess what? Those engineers can work anywhere they want because those engineers will make or break your company.

All right, without Steve Wozniak, Apple would still mean fruit. Well, enter the Woz of World War II, the guy who finally helps crack the code on the first Jeep, a middle-aged ex-prodigy from West Virginia named Karl K. Probst. In 1940, when every automaker in America is trying to build a supercar, Karl is a freelance engineer with his own consultancy firm in Detroit. But he started out as a certified wunderkind. At age 13, he built his own steam powered bicycle. Hey, smart kid. That literally blew up in his face. I mean, hey, Jack, what

teenager hasn't built and then blown up a bike? We've all been there. But that's not Carl's only source of cred. At age 29, he designed one of America's first cycle cars. And Jack, I'm looking at this cycle car right now. Never seen it before. It's kind of like if Fred Flintstone's ride was merged with a Rolls Royce. That's the vibe I'm getting. It looks a lot like a normal car, but I guess you used your legs to move it. Which actually sounds like a new workout craze, but I guess it never really took off. He called it the Dodo, which is unfortunately fitting since it never gets off the ground and soon goes extinct. Pro tip, yetis, don't name your product after an extinct animal.

It just doesn't work out usually. Only one prototype of the dodo ever gets made. Hey, at least it didn't explode, Jack. But this invention does help Carl make a name for himself as an engineer. It gets a rep for being the engineer you want on your team. So of course, when the army's request for proposals goes out, he gets a phone call. One company that desperately wants him is American Bantam. They'd already produced a bunch of ATV prototypes for the Army, so they're really hoping to win this bid. But there's more than just one contract on the line. Bantam happens to be on the verge of

bankruptcy. They're down to just 19 employees. So if they don't win this bid, they're toast. The whole company depends on this bid. And to win this bid, they need Carl. Carl. Bantam's president lays out all the details to Carl over the phone. Yes, we need a design in 11 days. No, there's no money up front.

And did I mention our company may go under? Ah, that's a tough sell. Now, Nick, if you were a sought-after engineer and you heard that pitch, how would you respond? I'd say, can I at least get like a DoorDash gift card? So obviously Carl says no. All right. But a couple days later, he gets another call from a much bigger guy. Literally. Nick, you remember Big Bill Knudsen? Yes. The GM president that FDR tapped to lead the war production office? Of course, the Danish-American Liam Neeson. How could I forget him, Jack? Well, he knows of Carl from his days at GM, and he knows if anyone can build this crazy G.I. Joe vehicle, it's this guy. So he calls up Carl personally to try to get him on board. Nick, want to read this quote from Big Bill here? Yeah, Jack, it's going to be a tough accent. I'll give it a shot, though. Here we go.

Quote from Big Bill here. Jack, it's going to be a tough accent. I'll give it a shot, though. Here we go. This is important to the country. Forget your office. If you bring this off, and I know you can, we'll see that you get some money. Some money?

That's it. Yeah, hopefully get something. Well, it must have been the patriotism that motivated him because Carl says yes. He's in, baby. And now the real work begins. The engineer Carl Probst sits in a deserted drafting room at American Bantam HQ in Butler, Pennsylvania. The room echoes. Every little sound bounces off the empty chairs and sloped drafting desks. Carl takes a pile of rejected designs, grabs some thumbtacks, and pins them to the wall. Something must be salvageable in all this. Now, the problem with

taking your time to accept the biggest challenge of your career? Uh, the clock, it doesn't stop in the meantime. So Carl, he did have 11 days to come up with a viable design for a lightweight general purpose vehicle, but that was almost a week ago. He now has five days to design this thing and deliver the plans Monday morning to the Army Quartermaster Corp. 300 miles away. But Jack, like we've said about those group projects, it's actually a fundamental law of innovation, isn't it, man? Constraints breed creativity. The more limiting the scenario, the more creative the result. Now, Carl isn't totally on his own. He's joined by a team, including Bantam's own chief engineer. But even so, there's a ton of pressure to get this right.

I gotta get it right. They get to work. From Wednesday till Friday, Carl drafts non-stop. Imagine crumpled blueprints piling up in the wastebaskets till they overflow. Mechanical pencils loaded and reloaded. Graphite sparkling on the smudged drafting tables. No time for food, just cup after cup of black coffee to keep the engineers upright. One by one, anyone not named Karl Probst goes home. Until it's Karl alone, working late into the night and then into the dawn. Then on Friday afternoon, Karl puts down his pencil. He stands up and stretches and then goes to the movies. Nice little Friday.

There on his desk are the design specs for something called the Jeep, the Blitz bug. Ah, the Blitz bug. I guess that works too, Jack. I mean, are you kidding though? Forget five days. This guy just got it done in 18 hours. He designed a completely new car concept in less time than it takes a banana to ripen. Yep. But remember, they don't have the gig yet, Nick. Good point.

So on Saturday, Carl hops in a car with Bantam's president and they race 300 miles southeast to the quartermaster's corpse office in Baltimore to pitch baby pitch. Now that is a long drive in the United States before interstates were a thing, Jack. Yeah, but when they finally arrive, they make a terrible discovery. Oh boy. Someone points out that their vehicle design is 500 pounds heavier than the Army specs. This thing is overweight! And the weight will affect their ability to fly these things inside of an aircraft. Or for your average grunt to push it out of the mud.

Can't be that heavy. But there's no time to fix it. Monday morning, 9 a.m. sharp, they show up at the Army office. Or for your average grunt to push it out of the mud. Can't be that heavy. But there's no time to fix it. Monday morning, 9 a.m. sharp, they show up at the Army office. And standing nearby are reps from three other car companies. Ford, Willys Overland, and a Cincinnati company called Crosley Motors. So wait, Jack. Out of 135 car companies in the United States at that moment,

there are only four companies total in this competition. Yeah, that's how hard this assignment was. Wow. Most automakers decided there's no chance, so they never even applied. Makes sense. So four contenders all waiting for the verdict. Everyone shoots some side eye at the competition and they just sit there and wait as the 30 long minutes go by. That is awkward, Jack. Then someone from the Quartermaster Corp emerges. They've reached a decision. Carl's design blew the others out of the water. Boom!

But wait, Jack, what about that thing where they blew past the weight limit? Turns out nobody made that weight limit. And Carl's application was the most complete. Willie's Overland had the audacity to turn in a sketch, one sketch. And Ford, they didn't submit a design at all. I mean, Jack, as you're describing it, it reminds me of something we've said before about job applications. Like, forget the requirements, just apply. Don't take yourself out of the running just because there's one bullet point in the qualifications that you don't meet.

You have no idea which requirements are secretly just a nice-to-have and not a must-have. And that's basically the situation here, isn't it, Jeff? Yeah, if Karl Probst let the weight limit snafu keep them from submitting their design, who knows how the Allies would have done in Europe without it. Despite missing that one piece of criteria, the weight, Carl's supercar design was way ahead

of the competition in every other way. And that's how it got selected. But don't break out the champagne for Bantam just yet. Okay.

They've designed a kick-ass all-purpose vehicle. Now, they have to build it. Bantam starts furiously working on their prototype. They drive their completed blitz buggy into an army camp for testing literally 30 minutes before the deadline.

It's Carl's design come to life. Bantam has done it. Here's a picture. Take a look. I mean, Jack, I'm looking at the photo of this thing, and this looks like it's related to a Jeep. Like, it's got that distinctive grill it's got the right angles yeah it's very jeepish so the army agrees it's ready they order 70 blitz buggies from bantam but plot twist they order prototypes from willies and ford too i'm

sorry pause the pot again jack bantam won the bid. So like, how are their competitors, Willys and Ford, still even in this thing? It comes down to some new rules around procurement or how the government engages with private companies. The army now has the permission to work with more than one company at a time. So they don't put all their eggs in one company's basket. So Jack, it's kind of like what we saw during COVID,

if you think about it. Like when the US government supported six different pharmaceutical companies in vaccine research under Operation Warp Speed. It's just like that. The army wants to deploy these Jeeps like we deployed those COVID jabs. So get this, Yetis, they actually make Bantam hand over their blueprints to the competition. Oh, it hurts, Jack.

I mean, it's like making Snapchat hand over their algorithm to Mark Zuckerberg. You know what Zuck's going to do with that thing, don't you, man? Zuck's going to Zuck it. The way the government sees it, they're all fighting the same cause. And since Uncle Sam paid for this Jeep design, they can share it with whomever they like. Plus, remember, Karl Probst made these blueprints for Bantam when they were on the brink of going under. Good point. How does the government know Bantam will be able to scale up enough for the war effort? The U.S. Army isn't going to put all its eggs in a basket that only has 19 employees. Meanwhile, yetis, remember it's 1940. Willy's, which you may not know today, but at the time was a huge automaker. So as Bantam cranks out their first 70 blitz buggies, Willie's Overland is

building their own version. And like any good rival, they add their own little twists. They upgrade the engine and they add a feature that will be defining for the Jeep. I assume it's the chassis. Well, they call their version the quad because it's a four by four. Jack, are we talking about the first ever all wheelwheel drive vehicle right now? That'd be convenient for this story, but no. The very first 4x4 was an 1824, but that one was powered by steam. Ah, steam. It gets us every time. So let's say this is the first 4x4 of the modern era.

We'll round up on this one. So yeti's Bantam, they got the Blitz Buggy. Great name. Willys has the Quad, but what's Ford's move, Jack? Ford unveils their version just 10 days after Willys, and they call it the Model GP for general

purpose. Model GP, Jack, I'm playing around with this in my head, and it almost sounds like Model Jeep, right? It sounds kind of like Model Jeep, man. Well, keep that thought in your back pocket. I got it, baby. Three automakers making three slightly different versions has

the potential to get kind of messy. Yeah, it does. So our old friend Big Bill Knudsen steps into brokerage. I mean, our Liam Neeson Viking, he's everywhere, Jack. He's the head of wartime production. What's he gonna do, play golf? Yeah, good point. So Bill works out a compromise between these three automakers.

They'll each keep refining their own version of Probst designs. This will let the army figure out which details they like best. And then they'll decide on one unified design, one Jeep to rule them all. All right. Now I'm really seeing the similarities between this Jeep story and the COVID vaccine, Jack. It's basically A-B testing at scale. So by early 1941, the army has commissioned 1,500 vehicles each for Bantam, Willys, and Ford. The U.S. isn't officially at war yet, remember, but we do start shipping the Allied forces some of these Jeeps that we're making. Nice. The Brits and the French get some to fight the Germans. The Australians and the French get some to fight the Germans. The Australians and the Chinese get some to fight over in the Pacific. Until December 7th, 1941, when the Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor.

We interrupt this broadcast and bring you this important bulletin from the United Press. Japanese have attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, by air. President Roosevelt has just announced. No more waiting. The United States enters the fight. And America brings with it the vehicle that's about to become a major thorn in Germany's side. So it's 1942. The United States is now at war. So let's take stock of our World War II Batmobile. I love that thing.

The standard Jeep weighs just over 2,000 pounds. For context, that's just about as heavy as two grand pianos or half as heavy as a mid-sized SUV. And not to mention way lighter than a 30-ton Sherman tank that was all over the battlefield, Jack. Exactly. The Jeep can also carry way more than expected, a payload of up to five soldiers or 800 pounds of cargo. They haul ammunition, artillery, medical supplies, rations, and even small aircraft across all kinds of terrain. The Jeep is built to be modular, too. So with special add-ons, it can become an ambulance, a firetruck,

or a makeshift train. Ford even starts making a version called the Seep that's an amphibious version that can go by land or, you guessed it, by sea. Now it ended up having some design flaws, but the amphibious Jeep sounds like the kind of thing that would make the Transformers jealous. Soldiers use Jeeps to lay telephone wires. They serve as radio patrol cars. You can ship them in by plane, or I still can't believe this, you can drop them by freaking parachute. And remember, the U.S. is sending Jeeps to all the allies, the British, the French, the Polish, the Russians, you name it. Enlisted men across all those nations' militaries trusted the jeep. Nice.

Generals loved the jeep. Ironically, one of the generals happiest to receive his jeep is one Joseph Stalin of the Soviet Union. Oh, and that's not even the wildest part because apparently the enemy loves the jeep too. Get this. When German soldiers would find jeeps on the battlefield, they would confiscate the Jeeps and drive them more often than they would destroy them. Basically, this Jeep is the vehicle for any soldier at war. And then on June 6th, 1944, we get D-Day. America and its allies are determined to retake continental Europe from Hitler. So they staged the biggest amphibious invasion in military history.

And Jack, I gotta imagine the Jeep plays a critical role. Oh yeah. 156,000 Allied troops stormed the beaches of Normandy, taking with them 100,000 tons of equipment and 50,000 vehicles, most of them Jeeps. Over the course of the week, some 326,000 troops land on that beach. And here's why those numbers matter so much. A massive invasion onto foreign soil can go really badly if you don't have a way to get off the beach ASAP.

But the Jeeps at Normandy let the invading troops mobilize quickly, get to higher ground, and then go on the offense. D-Day becomes the turning point of World War II, and everyone from Army generals to Supreme Allied Commander Dwight D. Eisenhower say it's thanks in big part to the Jeep. The Army Chief of Staff even calls the Jeep America's greatest contribution to modern warfare. Speaking of calling the Jeep, Jack, when do we actually start calling this thing, you know?

The Jeep. You're going to love this story, Nick. Oh. Okay, one of the most fun facts about the Jeep is that the name is a bit of a mystery. Hey, Jack, is this like a Scooby-Doo type mystery or is this like a true detective type mystery? Do I have to call McConaughey in for this one, man? More like a Merriam-Webster mystery for the etymology nerds out there. I'm here for it, Jack. So we know the Jeep started as three different models. Yes. Bantams is the Blitz buggy, Willys is the quad, and Fords is the GP. So one theory is that the Jeep is simply a slurring of the GP for general purpose.

GP, as you say, it kind of works out. Except that GP was Ford's internal technical name for the car. Okay. It doesn't appear anywhere on the body. So most GIs knew it by its other culturally dicier name, the Ford Pygmy. Okay, well, that's not it. So Jack, what's theory number two? Weirdly, the word Jeep already existed before the car.

It's slang from World War I, meaning new recruit. Interesting. So basically, the 1910s version of noob was the word Jeep. Yeah. So it's possible soldiers see this new untested thingamajig and lovingly call it a jeep. Well, Jack, honestly, I kind of love this theory too. But there's one more even more adorable theory. You ready for it, Nick?

Oh, I'm so ready for this, Jack. You've heard of the comic strip Popeye the Sailor, right? It came in a thing called newspapers. Jack, Popeye is the reason I eat spinach six times a day. Well, Nick, back in 1936, the Popeye comic strip introduced a strange and mysterious animal that Popeye keeps as a pet. Interesting. This is a yellow animal with a big red nose and white pot belly, like a mashup of a teddy bear and Hobbes the Tiger. And this thing can get in and out of small spaces to help Pope mashup of a teddy bear and Hobbes the tiger. And this thing can get in

and out of small spaces to help Popeye out of a jam. Jack, I'm looking at this thing and I'm kind of scared by it. Yeah, he's got interdimensional powers too. And his name is Eugene the Jeep. Eugene, wait for me. You ain't got no magical powers, but I got this. So Jack, all you're saying is that Popeye is a super popular comic with the soldiers those days. And maybe, just maybe, they name their vehicle that gets them out of tight spots after Eugene, the Popeye character. I'm not saying it, you just said it. But that is my favorite theory. Let's roll with that one. I love that one. However the name comes to be, it gets cemented into the American lexicon during a publicity stunt. A Willys test driver steers

the 4x4 up the steps of the U.S. Capitol. Boom! And when a reporter asks what it's called, the driver calls it a Jeep. Or maybe the driver said GP, or possibly even peep, which is what you do from recon vehicles. I like it. But whatever that driver said, the article describing the Army's new scout car in the paper the next morning, it published the word Jeep. As one Jeep slogan says, legends aren't born, they're made. By September 5th, 1945, it's official. The Allies have won. The troops are coming home. And for manufacturers, this means they can make products again for customers other than the U.S. military. Get this,

for three and a half years during World War II, zero, count them, zero civilian cars were manufactured in the United States. Because all the car companies were busy making aircraft carriers and tanks and other things we needed for the war. But now that the war's over, manufacturers are allowed to make consumer goods again. And the U.S. post-war economy kicks off with a vengeance. Unemployment is under 2%. The GI Bill puts money into the pockets of thousands of servicemen. For the first time in years, people have money to spend. And one thing they'd very much like to buy?

Jeeps. But remember, the Jeep was a joint collaboration between three competing automakers. So the big question becomes this. Who has the right to sell the Jeep? Okay. So altogether, American Bantam, Willys Overland, and Ford produced an estimated 660,000 Jeeps during the war. What we didn't tell you is it wasn't an even split. No, it wasn't. More than half of those wartime Jeeps were made by Willys Overland, around $350,000. Ford was number two with around $280,000.

But Bantam, the company that hired Karl Probst and invented the Jeep blueprint, they ended up making less than 3,000 Jeeps, or less than half a percent of the total. Jack, that's like being the inventor of the slam dunk, Bob Curland, if you're curious, only to watch Michael Jordan absolutely crush it with a dunk from the free throw line. Phantom comes up Bob Curland in this scenario. They invented the thing, but the army liked Willie's version of the Jeep best. Well, that was the one with the four-wheel drive, Jack. And once the war is over, they get to work making Jeeps for the general public. Their first version is called the

Jeep CJ2A for civilian Jeep. It gets a few upgrades that hadn't been available to army grunts, like a tailgate and bigger headlights. Instead of adding bazookas or armored plating, Jeep owners can add seats, snow plows, welders, lawnmower attachments, or even generators, and definitely couple. I have not seen the lawnmower Jeep yet, but I feel like I need to now see the lawnmower Jeep immediately, Jack. Willie's civilian Jeep sells for $1,090, or just under $19,000 in today's dollars. They moved more than 200,000 units between 1945 and 1949. So we know what you're wondering, besties. Why does this Jeep sell so well? Well, because it's the car that the Allies used to win the war. And that, that is brand affinity

you can't buy. That is pride sitting in your driveway. Yeah. Because Willys isn't just selling Jeeps. Willys is selling the emotion that comes with the Jeep. The emotion built on the tension and uncertainty of war. It's the feeling of seeing a bunch of Marines lift the American flag at Iwo Jima. Actually, McKinsey Group, the consulting firm, they've called this kind of visceral experience a peak moment. The part of a person's decision journey that they remember the most. And peak moments, they really drive consumer behavior. But Jack, we should point out, it's not just marketing and vibes that are making Jeeps so attractive to customers at that moment, is it? There are practical aspects too, like the whole four-wheel drive thing. As the United States

starts building its interstate highway system in the 1950s, for the first time, people had access to more and more remote places across the country. The 1950s might have been all about drag racing, but for Jeep owners, it was all about off-roading, which you start to see in the Jeep branding. Besties, we've actually covered some Jeep tag lines over the years in our pod. I mean, Jack, we're whipping up right here. Jeep, the toughest four-letter word on wheels. That's from the 1970s. Or how about this one from the 80s? Jeep, there's only one. Jack, great one right there. But how about this one? Go anywhere, do anything, Jeep. Now that's a slogan. Oh, plus, there are those bumper stickers that say like If you can read this, roll me over

And it's printed upside down Yeah, it's gotta be upside down People start creating Jeep clubs Jeep meetups And years later when the internet comes around Jeep online forums Honestly, it's a shocker to us there isn't a Jeep dating app Oh wait, there probably is a Jeep dating app

There probably is. It's probably called Peeps. And so, the Jeep continues to cultivate its adventurous all-American image. And as we said at the top,

it starts a 20-year run as the U.S.'s most patriotic brand. This despite the fact that the Jeep brand itself will change hands a bunch of times over the years. Oh, and Willys? They don't even hang on to it.

Nope. Willys gets bought out by Kaiser Motors and later passes to American Motors. And then Jeep ended up eventually with Chrysler, which was eventually bought by Fiat, which renamed itself to Stellantis. Which isn't even based in America. Stellantis, the owner of Jeep, is a European company. But while we're on the subject of who really owns the Jeep, we do have to address one thing. What about Karl Probst, Bantam's hired engineer, who did the blueprints in 18 hours? You may remember that one of the only things Bill Knudsen promised him was that he would get paid. Well, Carl was paid, but just $200.

In today's money, that's $4,300. All right, for helping win World War II, he got $4,300. This feels underpriced. Now, Carl never sought glory. He calls it the high point of his career. But at 79 years old, when he was dying of cancer, he decided to set the record straight. On the very last day of his life, he spreads his original Jeep drafts across his bed. When his body is discovered, so are his blueprints.

Wow. Now that is an intense way to share a legacy. And thanks to him, we have a lot of in-depth knowledge about the Jeep from the design level onward. We couldn't have told this story today without him. No, we couldn't. And who knows, Nick? Maybe the allies couldn't have won the war without him. So Nick, now that we've learned about the Jeep's dramatic birth under fire, its heroics on the beaches of Normandy. I like it.

And its successful transformation to domestic life. Whoa, where are we going, Jack? What is your takeaway? All right, here's my takeaway. Constraints breed creativity. Because if the army had gone to the automakers with like a blank check and a blank page and said, hey, we just need a car,

then we probably would have never gotten the Jeep at all. I mean, the army tried that, right? In the years before Carl, and the best thing we got was that belly flopper. Yeah, the belly flopper was a flop, Jack. But when the Army handed carmakers an almost impossible set of specifications, then that hackathon really paid off. We call this the psychology of limitation. The constraints, they make us more creative.

But Jack, what's your takeaway from the story of Jeep? The formula for a great brand is emotion plus tension. Emotion plus tension. For Jeep, the emotion was easy. Yeah. It's about the feeling of victory, pride, and grit. It's the patriotism that this American invention helped defeat one of the biggest threats in modern history. All right, so that's the emotion, the feeling.

But Jack, what's the tension, the contrast in the brand? The tension is that this car was built for war. But it's used today in your domestic life, which is very un-battle-like. That is a tension. Do you need a vehicle that can storm the beaches of Normandy? No! No! But the tension of having a car that can makes it exciting to own.

That's the formula for great branding. Emotion plus tension equals great branding. But Jack, now we've come to our favorite part of the show. The best facts yet. What do we got? Let's whip them up, man. Remember Big Bill Knudsen? Great guy.

The guy you tried to impersonate with that leathery voice. I did my best attempt. I was trying to do what I could do. Well, for his contributions to the Allied victory in World War II, he was the first and only American civilian to be named a lieutenant general in the U.S. Army. Wow, Liam Neeson could really play this guy. Let's get his agent a script, man. All right, so Jack, here's my fact for you.

The Jeep is the only vehicle ever to win a Purple Heart. Purple Hearts usually go to soldiers, not cars. I thought they only went to soldiers until I read this, man. The name of the Jeep that got the Purple Heart was Old Faithful. Yeah, and after sustaining holes in the windshield during the Battle of Guadalcanal, the soldiers who drove it successfully lobbied the army to give that car a Purple Heart. Old Faithful, we salute you. But yet, is the Jeep today?

It's basically a Hollywood movie star. Now, it hasn't gotten any plastic surgery. The Jeep has basically kept its same iconic look, but that may be why the Jeep has starred in so many iconic films. It's been in everything from Saving Private Ryan to The Goonies. Remember in the Jurassic Park movie, when Laura Dern turns that guy's head to look at the brontosaurus? I do remember it, Dr. Grant. As long as you don't get out of the car, Newman, with that one dinosaur with the floppy ears pops out, you're going to be safe in that Jeep.

And how about in Clueless, when Cher accidentally drives on the freeway and she has to pull over, they're so freaked out. As is! She's driving a snow white Jeep that her dad bought her. Oh, yeah, we should cut her some slack, by the way, Jack. She was, you know, grappling with her feelings about Josh. But Jack, we should also point out

that Jeep had an impact on the music industry. Remember those 90s Jeep mixes with the boosted bass? LL Cool J, Cameron, Master Ace, Missy Elliott. Yeah, they all paid homage to their favorite 4x4. From World War II to Missy Elliott, Jeep really is the best idea yet. But Jack, before we go, I got to ask you, what was the grade that you got on that group project? I'm going to round up and say an A, Nick. I'm going to round up. Coming up on the next episode of The Best Idea Yet,

it's a spicy one. What do we got, Jack? We are covering sriracha. And we got some pizza bites that we need to squirt that on. You got it in your fridge, but you had no idea where it actually came from. Follow The Best Idea Yet on the Wondery app, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to every episode of The Best Idea Yet early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at wondery.com slash survey.

The best idea yet is a production of Wondery hosted by me, Nick Martel, and me, Jack Kravici-Kramer. Our senior producer is Matt Beagle and Chris Gauthier. Matt Wise is our producer. Our senior managing producer is Nick Ride and Taylor Sniffen is our managing producer. Our associate producer is H Conley. This episode was written by Katie Clark Gray and Anna Rubinova. Research by Samuel Fatzinger. We use many sources in our research, including Arthur Herman's book, Freedom's Forge, how American business produced victory in World War II. Sound design and mixing by C.J. Dramella. Fact-checking by Molly Artwick. Our music supervisor is Scott Velasquez

and Jolina Garcia from Freeze On Sync. Our theme song is Got That Feelin' Again by Black Lack. Executive producers for Nick and Jack Studios are me, Nick Martell, and me, Jack Ravici-Kramer. Executive producers are Dave Easton, Jenny Lauer-Beckman, Aaron O'Flaherty, and Marshall Louis for Wondery.