A sign on Hansen Avenue proclaims Butler home to the invention of the Jeep.

The Jeep, especially the Bantam model, is a deep part of the history of Butler.

A new book by William Spear explores the history of the Jeep from its start as an Army Reconnaissance Vehicle and beyond.

“Warbaby” is a 400-page look at the origins and history of the Jeep, a history in which Butler plays a prominent part.

“My interest is in getting the story out,” Spear said. “I think it's an important book for the people in Butler.”

The coffee-table book is a detailed account of the Jeep's beginnings at the American Bantam Car Co. in Butler and follows its progress as a military transport vehicle and the struggles to name the rightful creator of the model.

It is filled with pictures and detailed drawings of the Jeep, imagined by employees at Bantam.

“I don't think Bantam is the ancestor of the Jeep, it is the Jeep,” Spear said.

Spear, who splits his time between California and Alaska, spent nearly 15 years researching the history of the Jeep, talking with Jeep owners and historians, as well as poring over information at the National Archives in Washington, D.C., with the intention of educating the public about the brand.

“To me, the Jeep is the most brilliant industrial design of the 20th century,” Spear said by phone from his home in Alaska.

Spear has been interested in the civilian Jeep models for years and belongs to a West Coast club for Jeep owners. But, it was after he bought his first Bantam Jeep in the 1990s that he began to wonder about the origins of the brand.

Spear spent hours in archives paging through information tracing the history of the Jeep, but was hamstrung by restrictions on photocopying the material.

Finally, Spear said, he was able to get 8,000 pages of photographed records and began the painstaking work of tracing the lineage of the Jeep brand.

“It's always great to have people do the research and have the history preserved for future generations,” said Pat Collins of the Butler County Historical Society.

Spear credits Collins for her help with some of the information about Butler while he was writing.

Collins said she recently got a shipment of the books at the historical society.

“He traveled the United States in search of first-hand documentation,” she said.

In 1940, the Army asked the American automobile industry to design a four-wheel drive reconnaissance vehicle that could transport soldiers and artillery.

Both the Bantam company and Willys-Overland Motors of Ohio submitted blueprints, Spear said.

According to Spear, Bantam won the contract and convinced engineer Karl Probst to travel from Detroit to help design the Bantam Reconnaissance Car. The Army then gave the blueprints to Willys-Overland and that company manufactured 600,000 Jeeps for the Army.

“The Army always gets credit for the Jeep,” Spear said. “I don't think they're deserving of the credit they get.”

What followed was a battle for credit of the Jeep brand, Spear said.

“Willys tried to take credit, big companies tried to take credit, politicians tried to take credit,” he said. In advertisements, Willys claimed it created the Jeep, but the Federal Trade Commission ruled in 1948 Bantam should get credit for creating the Jeep, Spear said.

The American Bantam Car Co. manufactured 2,675 Jeeps before shuttering its factory in 1956.

“Warbaby” is available at the Butler County Historical Society or online at warbaby.wmspear.com or through Amazon.