In the most recent episode of the podcast “Oh You Didn’t Know,” WWE Senior Vice President of Live Events “Road Dogg” Brian James stated that the Jeep that was used on RAW was the same Jeep that was used for their invasion on WCW:
“That is the original Jeep that we rode down in Norfolk in. I mean, it’s the exact same Jeep. We went to the dude’s house on WWE and A&E Treasure Hunters. Myself and Mick Foley went to the guy’s house to try to buy it from him. We wanted it for the Hall of Fame, for Axxesses, to have this original iconic DX Jeep.”
“So on that television show, Treasure Hunters, we were allotted a little bit of money to negotiate with the guy. So when we got into his house in North Carolina, he’s got a ton of stuff. His dad was the driver of the Jeep. Colonel Willie was his name. He drove at Norfolk down that infamous ramp. He’s got a great collection of military stuff and just an awesome collection. He passed on, but his son, John, who drove us in the Jeep, that’s his Jeep now. So we said, ‘Throw out a number. We’re going to start negotiations.’ He said, ‘No, no.’ He was hesitating. He didn’t want to say it. So finally, I said, ‘Out of respect, we’re not gonna throw out a number either because we don’t know what you’re thinking. I don’t want to disrespect you. Please just throw out a number.’ He said, ‘Okay. $300,000.’ We had like 35 grand to negotiate. So we said, ‘No, we’re gonna let you keep it, but can we borrow it? Can we loan it? We pay you to travel and ship it and bring it here. You shine it up and handle it all, but we’re gonna bring it to different pay-per-views.’ So the guy was like, ‘Yeah, sure, I’ll do that.’”
“So what he wants to do is, and this was his thought process, to open a museum of Military History Museum. He has got everything from the first ever Marine paratroopers, full uniforms, to all kinds of stuff. It was incredible to see. Japanese machine guns, and I mean, he’s got everything you can think of. He wants to open that museum and with this Jeep, his vision is to put the Jeep in the middle of the museum, and on one side, have it be a period accurate, you know, soldiers, mannequins, or whatever, like that would have accompanied the Jeep from 1952. On the other side would be DX members. He wants it to be the centerpiece. So his point was, I’ll sell you this Jeep, but I’m going to sell it for a price that I can buy my whole museum, or I’m going to keep it and it’s going to be my centerpiece in my museum. We couldn’t afford to pay, you know, I mean, we could, but we didn’t want it that bad. So he gets to keep it. We get to borrow it. Best thing ever. So yeah, that’s the official Jeep that we drove down in 25 years prior to that, and it’s beautiful. He keeps them in great shape.”
You can listen to the complete podcast below:
(h/t to Wrestling News for the transcription)
