What is missing in the Jeep line-up?

I will start this blog with a quote from the superduckie5000…

“A Question!   From The Days Of Future Past - Get It. Right.   What Set of Wheels Begins With the Letter “G”?

THE MAD DUCK.   All to Be Reviled Many Moons Out!”

I don’t know about you but my decoder ring has never ever worked.  I don’t think that I have ever understood any of the duckies remarks.  I also don’t know if I understand what the above quote is about…but I will tell you what I think the duckie is trying to say at the end of this blog. 

Some HISTORY OF THE JEEP BRAND

Willys MB started it all…

It was the jeep that started it all…sort of like the ring that controlled them all.  I will not go into the history of the Willys MB, any jeep lover knows all there is to know about this wonderful vehicle.

Willys Jeep Pick-up

The Willys Jeep Pick up was introduced to the world in 1947 and was dropped in 1965.  The Willys Jeep Pick-up was based off of the Willys Jeep Wagon and the VJ-2 and VJ-3 Willys Jeepster.  In the life-span of the Pick up, more than 200,000 were manufactured.  Kaiser buys Willys-Overland and changes name to Willys Motor Company in 1953.

FC-150 and 170

The Jeep Forward Control (FC) was a truck produced by Willys and then Kaiser Jeep from 1956 to 1965.  The FC-150 started production in 1956 and a year later the 170 was being manufactured.  And a year later; production of the FC-170 DRW (dual rear wheel) truck begins.  In 1963 the Willys Motor Company changes it’s name again to Kaiser-Jeep Corporation.

Jeep Gladiator

In 1965, the Gladiator J-Series pickup debuts as a replacement for the Willys Pickup.  The Gladiator was the replacement to the Willys Pick up and not the Jeep Forward Control because the FC were a Full Size truck and were not a Pick up.  When the Gladiator was debut in 1965 they were refereed to as the Jeep Gladiator but as time went on their name changed to the Jeep Trucks or J-Trucks.  The Gladiator was a full-size pickup based on the SJ Jeep Wagoneer SUV.  Another thing of interest was that the Jeep Wagoneer station wagons and Jeep Gladiator utes were the first Jeep vehicles designed from the ground up for a civilian rather than military purpose. They also were the first to provide automatic transmission and complete passenger-car styling. Thus, the combination of four-wheel drive and automatic transmission was an automotive industry first.  The Gladiator was finally discontinued in 1970 and in the same year the American Motors Corporation takes over Kaiser-Jeep. (Another note of interest: in 1971 the American General is spun off from American Motors Corporation. This company later produces the HMMWV.  Does the seven slot grill on the HMMWV ring a bell?)

Jeep Honcho

The Jeep Honcho was a full-size pickup truck based on the SJ Jeep Wagoneer SUV. It was sold through the 1970s and was discontinued in 1986.

CJ-8 Scrambler

The CJ-8 Scrambler was a pickup truck version of the CJ-7, introduced in 1981. It featured a 103 in wheelbase and a pickup bed. Only 27,792 were built in the 6 years of production.  It was produced from 1981-1986. 

Jeep Comanche

The Comanche (MJ) was a pickup truck version of the downsized Cherokee (XJ). It was a unibody vehicle, an oddity for a pickup truck. The Comanche production started up in 1986 and was discontinued in 1992. Sales of the Cherokee and Commanche took off in 1987; unfortunately, AMC had already agreed to the merger with Chrysler. The Comanche along with the Cherokee XJ could have saved the drowning American Motors however they had already agreed for a merger with the Chrysler Corporation in 1987.

One reason why the Comanche’s life-span was so short was because it competed with Chrysler’s own, mid-sized Dodge Dakota pickup. The conventional wisdom at the time was that Chrysler wanted to focus sales on the more popular Dodge Dakota rather than the Comanche.

So it has been close to 20 years since the Jeep brand has had a small pick-up (Scrambler) and 14 years since Jeep has had a mid-size pick-up (Comanche).
Pick-ups are a part of the Jeep brand; they are a part of their history This philosophy may seem odd at this at this point in the Jeep brand, but that is only due to the long period of the lack of pick-ups.
It is time that Jeep reversed this trend….PRODUCE the Gladiator. I and many other Jeep fanatics beg you.
I will go back to the superduckie quote at the beginning of this blog:
“A Question!   From The Days Of Future Past - Get It. Right.   What Set of Wheels Begins With the Letter “G”?
I am hoping that the duckie is saying that a production Gladiator will make its debut at one of the coming auto shows.
Jeep owes it to its costumers and to its history to produce this vehicle.
So to answer the question I posed at the beginning: What is missing in the Jeep line-up…it is the Gladiator Pick-up.