Willys-Overland Finishing Plant (67-48)
Location: Adams Street outside of the Toledo School for the Arts. [Google Street View]*
*Note:the 2019 image capture does not show the marker erected later in 2019
Text: Since 2004, the building at 14th and Adams Streets has been the home of the Toledo School for the Arts. The Willys-Overland Corporation erected the building c. 1916 to finish, ship, and sell the company's cars. The popular Whippet and other models were delivered here to a second story loading dock from the Willys plant along what became Jeep Parkway. Vehicles were displayed behind floor-to-ceiling windows in a first floor showroom. The firm of Mills, Rhines, Bellman, and Nordoff designed the building and others in Toledo during the first third of the 20th century. In 1908, John North Willys (1873-1935) consolidated his company's automobile production in Toledo. By 1912, Willys-Overland sales were second only to the Ford Motor Company's. The company's most famous product is the Jeep, which transported Allied service members from WWII to the 1980s and was a precursor to the sports utility vehicle.
The marker on the Adams Street side of the School erected in 2019
Willys-Overland Finishing Plant marker (Adam street side)