What you think the word "jeep" means will depend on how old you are. When I was a little kid, I knew Eugene the Jeep from Popeye cartoons. I thought he was called a jeep because that was the noise he made. My father told me that military vehicles were called jeeps as a slang term for "general purpose vehicles," and that the Popeye character was named that because he was a "general purpose animal." It made sense to me.
Now, of course, Jeep is a brand name of sport utility vehicles. They are descended from the vehicle Willys-Overland developed for the US military during World War II. The lowercase "jeep" is used for a variety of off-road vehicles. Is the name really short for "general purpose"? The evidence for this is murky, although the military did use the title "general purpose" for a lot of equipment -and even personnel- as far back as World War I. There are also those who are sure that the military vehicle was named after Eugene, who debuted in 1936. Read what we know and what we don't know about the word "jeep" at The Drive.
(Image credit: Richardkiwi)
