When Chrysler announced the death of Jeep's Grand Wagoneer in 1991, a Texas feedlot owner and meat-packing magnate named Leon Miller contacted the company to inquire what was going on. Chrysler patched him through to the vehicle's original designer, Brooks Stevens. The two commiserated briefly, and Stevens lamented Lee Iacocca's decision to concentrate on the smaller, cheaper Jeep Cherokee because of the threat posed by Ford's more compact Explorer. Then the designer offered the cattleman an intriguing suggestion.
"He told me, 'Get you a late-model one and go through every piece of it,'" says Miller. "'Take it apart and put it back together. Make it like a new one.' He said he thought there might be a market for it."
Miller followed the advice, selling that first finished product to a curious neighbor who had watched him labor. In a short time Miller would repeat the process, then again, and then again and again, until finally, 15 years later—having bought, restored, and sold more than 1,200 of Stevens's babies—he's the Grand Wagoneer guru.
Miller prefers the term "renew" to "restore"; it's truer to the affection he feels for the car. The Grand Wagoneer was effectively America's first luxury SUV, a predecessor to the Cadillac Escalade in price as well as style. It had power windows, seats, and locks; thick shag carpet to ensure a quiet ride; saddle-leather upholstery; and that faux-wood paneling along its sides. Its preppy sophistication made it a favorite in Waspy New England enclaves from New Canaan to Nantucket, but it fit just as well with the other woodies headed for Southern California beaches. And it was one more status symbol for windshield farmers and ranchers showing off their spreads in the Midwest and Texas.
In a sense, it was born a classic, its body style barely changing since its inception. Brooks Stevens had already created such timeless designs as the front end of the Harley-Davidson Hydraglide and the Miller High Life logo. When the Willys Motor Company first commissioned Stevens to create a four-wheel-drive station wagon in the early sixties, they asked for a look some-where between wagons like Chevy's Kings-wood and Ford's Country Squire. But Stevens couldn't ignore Jeep's rugged military heritage (this was to be the World War II stalwart's first nonmilitary-based vehicle), and he balked at creating another Detroit look-alike. When the first Wagoneer rolled off the line in 1962, shaped like a shoe box and solid as a Sherman tank, Stevens made his statement. And even when he introduced his luxury-class updates in the seventies and eighties, he kept that iconic body, distinctive as a Coke bottle.
Miller, a soft-voiced, gray-headed man whose front yard is dotted with ornamental duck decoys, sees his mission as continuing Stevens's vision. He runs Wagonmaster in a small four-bay garage on a half-acre lot in downtown Kerrville—a handsome stop in Texas Hill Country near Austin and San Antonio—selling seven to eight better-than-new Wagoneers a month (95 percent of them sight-unseen from his Web site, wagonmaster.com) for an average of $25,000 apiece. He takes in only low-mileage models—no more than 70,000 miles allowed—from all over the country, and then puts each one through a 250-point checklist. He gives them new fuel and water pumps, exhaust systems, carburetors, and electrical modules, and has a stockpile of untouched vintage elements—grills, dashboards, and the signature paneling. Miller's six employees include three detailers who give the vehicles a Q-tip-fine cleaning. And though he'll provide a few modern touches like CD players and heated front seats, he refuses to dress up any Jeep with mud tires or brush guards. "The trick is to get them as near to original as possible," he says. "These were rolling pieces of art."
Oddly enough, since Stevens's death in 1995 he has been best remembered for coining the phrase "planned obsolescence," an endorsement of the marketing strategy of coaxing the public to buy new goods before the old ones have worn out. Yet his Grand Wagoneer was irreplaceable and timeless, and there's no better proof than the mint-condition models on Leon Miller's lot.
