At low cost and fair speed, Willys-Overland transformed its all-steel station wagon into a sporty four-seat phaeton, and it sold in decent numbers for a short time.

The Jeepster story really begins with independent designer Brooks Stevens, who as early as 1941 was already exploring potential civilian applications for the military Jeep. With the success of Stevens’ all-steel Willys station wagon in 1946 (see our feature here), Willys-Overland chairman Ward Canaday was encouraged to expand on the theme. The company had raised $21 million in new capital to produce the wagon, and evidently there were a few dollars left over.

While Stevens originally imagined the Jeepster as a light-hearted two-place runabout,  CEO Charles Sorensen could see the vehicle had greater sales potential as a four-place phaeton, and Stevens was happy to oblige. Upon leaving Ford, Sorensen had come to W-O in 1944 not just to facilitate war production, but to help the company make the jump back to civilian vehicles. And with the station wagon as a platform, the Toledo automaker was in a position to move forward, at low cost and fair speed, with the Jeepster.

The job of transforming the Stevens proposal into a real production vehicle fell to Delmar G. “Barney” Roos, Willys-Overland’s vice president of engineering. (He’s shown above in 1949 with an early Jeepster prototype.) An industry veteran whose resume included stints at Pierce-Arrow, Marmon, Studebaker, and Rootes in Britain, he came to W-O in 1938, and there he had led the company’s development of the Jeep, the four-wheeled hero of World War II.

Since the Jeepster’s steel body shell was essentially an open tub with little torsional rigidity, Roos added a hefty stamped X-member to the center of the station wagon’s simple ladder frame (both shown above). Naturally, the Jeepster shared the wagon’s 104-in wheelbase and Roos-engineered Planadyne independent front suspension with transverse leaf spring. All Jeepsters were two-wheel drive—there never was a four-wheel drive version.

Above, a group of executives and dignitaries inspect a Jeepster prototype on the Wolcott Boulevard side of the Willys-Overland plant. It’s not giving anything away to note that the Jeepster shared a fair amount of its exterior sheet metal with the station wagon. The dash and instruments were from the wagon, too. A very basic vehicle, the Jeepster offered only a manual folding top and side curtains instead of roll-up windows for weather protection. Launched in March of 1948, the Jeepster was given a more formal introduction in July at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York.

A complete Jeepster chassis is shown above on the assembly line at the already ancient Toledo plant—parts of the complex dated back to 1885. For the 1948 introduction, all Jeepsters used the same 134 cubic-inch L-head four as the WWII Jeep, producing all of 63 horsepower and coupled to a three-speed manual transmission. To lengthen the Jeepster’s legs a bit an overdrive unit was made standard, and in 1949, the Willys L-head six became available.

The $1,765 list price included extra equipment  to spruce up what was really a fairly rudimentary vehicle, no offense: whitewall tires, bumper guards, trim rings, a cigar lighter. While the Jeepster offered open-air fun and adventure, it was no bargain. At the time, Ford and Chevrolet base models were priced under $1,500. Historian Patrick Foster described the throwback Willys phaeton as “the Jeep that wanted to be a car.”

Above, three ladies pose with a production 1948 Jeepster. We don’t know this, but we imagine they’re secretaries from the W-O administration building just behind them. The modest success of the Jeepster can be attributed to the fact that in 1948, the public was buying anything with four wheels and a set of keys. The economy was booming, there were years of pent-up demand, and the U.S auto industry was still getting back up to speed, creating a raging seller’s market.

We can see this in the sales arc: 10,000 cars in ’48, then 2,300 in ’49 as the automakers were catching up to the demand. A mild facelift in ’50 didn’t help. The Jeepster was offered in ’51, but these were actually leftover ’50 models. Of course, none of this bothers the Jeepster enthusiasts of today in the least. They’re enjoying the quirky fun of one of America’s more unusual post-WWII cars.