Ver. 2.0

Today in Survival History
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On this day in 1940, the first Jeep prototype was delivered to the Camp Holabird military base in Maryland. It was built by the American Bantam Car Company of Butler, Pennsylvania, as the first of a 70-vehicle contract with the U.S. Army. Two other companies, Willys and Ford, were competing with Bantam to win the large-scale contract for the four-wheeled, all-terrain utility vehicles he army was looking for. Although the army's final specifications were based mostly on Bantam's design, the contract went to Willys, who had the large-scale production facilities needed to meet the demand. The first Jeep designed for civilian use was produced in 1945; Jeeps are now manufactured by Daimler-Chrysler, which purchased the company that owned Willys in 1987.

My supervisor's boss has a new 4WD Ford picup and an older Jeep that's set up for offroading. Aftermarket shocks, 36-inch tires, a winch; you know the drill. Today he drove the Jeep to work.

And parked it on top of a three-foot mound of snow.