History J.P., D.E. & One Rare Willys

Rare body style or not, a '41 Willys should be a Hot Rod/Gasser IMO.

 

Awesome blog. I love mysteries like this...hopefully it will turn back up one day! Thanks

 

I remember seeing that J.P.& Dee Willys often at Island Dragway. It would run against my friends,the Fischetti Bros. in eliminations. The traction bars were made from old railroad track. Lloyd told me "We like'em beefy!" Actually,it was to add some weight to make class.

 

Neat story.

 

Having showed concours and having never met a car that I at least didn't want to modify a little,I'd probably be going into contortions(ala James T. Kirk) before I'd decide to bring it back to its 1960s glory.Let the other 2 or 3 chase the perfection rainbow....I'm going racing

 

Rae or not old race car or not I would probably just try and make it run and drive my way and never look back. Sometimes you should just treat a cool car like it is your own, especially if you are the one who owns it.

Cool story on a cool piece of history.

 

I remember some discussion and pics of that car in the 1937-42 Willys thread.

 

The car in the background is a mid to late 70's Camaro or Firebird.

 

One would think that paying that sum 30 years ago .... would lead to some semblance of resto' somewhere. That was a lot of money then. Who and what made it impressionable to them ? Don Garlits was that you ? Come on ... stop holding' out.

 

I just had a thought...and I hope I'm wrong. What do you suppose the odds are that whoever bought it either turned it into a coupe or used parts of it to repair a coupe body? Normally it's the other way around - I have seen a number of really nice coupes in other models of cars cut up to use for parts in the restoration of a convertible. However, Willys coupes are the gold standard of gassers/hot rods and I could see someone thinking this was a hacked up coupe and "restoring" it back into a coupe.

 

I have only seen one Willys convertible like this. It was a rare car when it was new. The one I've seen is on display at the Little White House, FDR's vacation home in Warm Springs GA. It's a '40 if I remember right.

 

Not the same car at all but I remember seeing a Willys convertible at, I believe, the NSRA nat'ls that was held in Minneapolis/St.Paul years ago. It was a medium green color. I wasn't sure if it was real or a cut-down coupe, don't know if I saved the photos of it or not but it was the only Willys convert I ever saw in the flesh.

 

Rare, yes indeed,
How about a one of five Willys that was produced that there is only one known left that is getting a straight axle, and hemi, push button torque and an Olds rear?
Stay tuned!

 

Not the same car at all but I remember seeing a Willys convertible at, I believe, the NSRA nat'ls that was held in Minneapolis/St.Paul years ago. It was a medium green color. I wasn't sure if it was real or a cut-down coupe, don't know if I saved the photos of it or not but it was the only Willys convert I ever saw in the flesh.

I remember that one too, and it was a green color. I think it might have had right hand drive as well, which would make it possibly an Aussie car. I have a picture of it somewhere...I'll look. The owner said they were going to do a mold and make fiberglass convertible bodies...we've seen some over the years, but don't know if it was from that car .
Willys did several prototypes in those years that never went into production...eg. the Model 99 (full size version of the 77), the woodies (I have a factory picture of a '37-38 woody but have never seen one from those years), and perhaps some convertibles too, along with the one for FDR.
g-willys