Russ Erwin, East Providence, dressed in the 29th Infantry uniform, takes a photo of the 1945 Studebaker M-29C Amphibious Weasel, owned by David Welch, Gillette, N.J. It is the only factory class weasel restored in the world.

This was a car show with a difference.

Some 75 military vehicles, including an armored carrier, a half-track, plenty of Jeeps and trucks and a couple of small World War II tracked vehicles known as M29 Weasels were on display at the Historic Military Vehicle Show at Quonset the Air Museum last weekend.

The show is an annual event hosted by the Rhode Island Military Vehicle Collectors’ Club.

“It’s no different from a Model A club,” said club chairman Eric deRochambeau of North Kingstown, noting the advantages of collecting and maintaining military vehicles include “one color (green), no chrome and no wax.”

“None of the vehicles go over 50 miles per hour,” he added. “We go anywhere, but move slowly.”

Apart from the vehicles, the show provided food as well as a number of merchants selling military paraphernalia, including books, medals, posters as well as odds and ends. One merchant had brought a large number of German military pieces, including iron crosses, Nazi armbands and even a spoon engraved with “Waffen SS” on the back.

DeRochambeau, who grew up in Connecticut and Paris, due to his French father’s business interests, said his interest in collecting vehicles started when he was a child.

“It started with Dinky Toys,” he said referring to a famed British line of toy model cars that were popular in the 1950s and ’60s. “It fits in your pocket and then (I moved) to the bigger stuff.”

DeRochambeau said he started collecting about 30 years ago with a 1955 Volvo radio car built for the Swedish Army and now has some 14 vehicles. He said he had restored the bodies of a number of his vehicles — one of his Jeeps had been “like Swiss cheese” — and had a mechanic rebuild the engine.

“I was always a manual kind of guy,” he said, noting that his carpentry and metal working skills served him well in restoring his vehicles.

DeRochambeau’s collection includes nine vintage Army Jeeps as well as a 1981 German Unimog cargo truck and a Land Rover FC101 artillery tractor that he bought from the Land Rover Museum in Dunsfold, Surrey, and had shipped to U.S. It had belonged to the Royal Regiment of Artillery.

The Rhode Island Military Vehicle Collectors’ Club was established in 1998 and has about 75 members, according to president Paul Connolly of North Smithfield, who served with the Marines. He said it hopes to create a museum in the state to store and showcase military vehicles.

“We meet once a month at a variety of places,” he said, adding that the place often ended up being deRochambeau’s house in North Kingstown due to its central location.

The name Jeep derives from the phonetic label GP which was applied to early models: what it stands for remains open to debate. Some argue that it stands for “General Purpose,” but deRochambeau said Ford’s GP designation referred to a “government vehicle with an 80-inch wheelbase.”

The first Jeeps were produced by American Bantam, Butler, Pa., which had originally been established as an American subsidiary of Britain’s Austin Motors. DeRochembeau said the Department of the Army commissioned Bantam in 1941 to come up with a tough, quarter-ton, four-wheel-drive vehicle to replace the mule.

Connolly noted the Army had already experimented with four-wheel-drive vehicles in 1916 and 1917 “chasing down Pancho Villa in (northern Mexico).”

Bantam produced 1,500 models of a prototype, the BRC (Bantam Reconnaissance Car) 40, in 45 days, “from drawing to driving,” according to deRochembeau. He said about 10 BRC 40s remain, with one in storage with the Smithsonian Museum.

The BRC was a success and the government, which owned the blueprints and was concerned that one small facility might not be able to produce sufficient quantities and would be vulnerable to sabotage, handed over production to Ford Motor Co. and Willys-Overland Motors Inc. of Toledo, Ohio.

By war’s end, Ford and Willys had produced over 500,000 of the quarter-tons and they had become known as the World War II Willys Jeep.

“The Jeep was a Kleenex car,” said deRochambeau, noting that it was expected to last about 30 days in combat conditions. After that it was stripped down for parts.

The show had a number of Jeeps on hand, many dating back to World War II. DeRochambeau had two of his on show, the oldest being a 1941 Preproduction Ford GP model. How tell the difference between a Ford Jeep and a Willys Jeep? “Every part of a Ford has an F on it, down to the nuts and bolts,” he said.

Connolly had also brought two vintage Jeeps, these ones dating back to the Vietnam war: a 151A1 from 1967 and a 151A2 from 1971. Both had machine gun mounts between the front seats and were set up as command centers with big military radios in the rear.

David Cargill of Cumberland, who served with the 1st Cavalry Division for 18 months in Korea in the late 1950s, brought his 1945 Willys Jeep complete with shovels and axes attached to the side, portable gas tank and spare wheel attached to back. Under the windscreen, one had a sheath for a period carbine that he hoped to find, noting that they were very expensive.

Kenny Holmes, of Worcester, Mass., brought his 1952 M38 A1 Jeep, the first model with rounded fenders. Connolly said the flat hoods and fenders of WWII Jeeps were sometimes used as makeshift altars for religious services in the field.

Holmes said he got into collecting military vehicles because they were “affordable, don’t have to be perfect — war wounds seem to be okay — and the parts are available.”

What’s a vintage military Jeep worth? At the bottom of the scale, about $500, according to Connolly. “That means it has four tires and looks like a Jeep,” he said, adding that a fully restored Jeep could cost $15,000 and up. He said he had purchased his Jeeps fully restored. “I just change the oil and maintain them,” he said.

In addition to his Jeeps, and Unimog and Land Rover trucks, deRochambeau also brought his blue 1943 Ford GTB one-and-a-half ton Navy flatbed truck to the show. He said it runs at about 30 miles an hour — top speed 50 mph but “very bumpy.”

Don Robinson of Norton, Mass., had brought his 1941 Autocar half-track armored truck, which had seen service with both the U.S. and Israeli armies. He said he’d owned it for 17 years and pointed out how quarter-inch steel plates could be raised or lowered to cover the windows, virtually turning the vehicle into a tank.

The show included three examples of an unusual vehicle from World War II: the M29 Weasel. The 1945 vehicles, which were designed for snow, were the smallest tracked vehicles used by the Army during World War II.

Russ Erwin of East Providence, who was dressed in the uniform of the 29th Infantry, said he had just purchased his rusty Weasel and planned to restore it. The other two, which were restored, had been trailered up from New Jersey. One, owned by David Welch, was equipped to be amphibious, with a hull and rudders; the tracks provided propulsion.

“They were basically small tanks that could cross rivers and lakes,” said deRochambeau.

Richard Wark, a mechanic who owned the other Weasel, said he also owned a military Jeep and truck. “Anyone who’s into green doesn’t have just one green piece,” he said, referring to military vehicles.

“I just love the stuff,” he said. “It’s living history.”

pelsworth@projo.com