Where did the name Little Red Wagon originate? Credit for that goes to then-CPD Chief Engineer Howard Pickle. One day, Howard was down at the Woodward Avenue Garage, when someone delivering a load of parts inquired, "What are all these parts for?" To which, Pickle replied, "They're for that little red wagon we're playing with over there in the corner." Of course, when you hear the name Little Red Wagon,most fans automatically associate the name Bill "Maverick" Golden with the project. By late-1964, Frank Wylie had decided to turn the Little Red Wagon over to Golden, who had raced Mopar Super Stock cars with moderate success for a number of years, but through Product Planning Department allocations, was officially out of a corporate ride for the upcoming 1965 season. Right about that time, the late George Hurst, who's Warminster, Pennsylvania, shifter manufacturing empire Hurst Performance had successfully collaborated with Chrysler Corporation on numerous special projects, created the Hurst Hemi Under Glass, a 1964 Plymouth Barracuda exhibition wheelstander driven by Wild Bill Shrewsberry. Historically, the Hurst Hemi Under Glass was the first purpose-built exhibition wheelstander on record. Remember, at inception, the Little Red Wagon was never intended to be a wheelie truck. Had it not been for the Hurst Hemi Under Glass, the Little Red Wagon may have become just another automotive curiosity. Collectively though, the two vehicles could tour the country wooing fans from coast to coast with their quarter-mile side-by-side, bumper-dragging wheelies. "Dodge asked me to take the truck on the road and campaign it," reminisced Golden. "But the first time I drove it, I thought that it was a scary piece of equipment. I mean, the thing would just beat you up something awful." Maverick's public debut with the Wagon was at the 1965 AHRA Grand American race at Long Beach, California's Lions Associated Drag Strip in front of a packed house. Golden would leave the starting line with the wheels up in the air, set it down, then go back up in the air the moment he would shift gears. That proved hard on both him and the truck.
Later that year, while racing up in Canada, someone suggested that perhaps Golden consider shifting the Little Red Wagon's TorqueFlite transmission to on-the-fly. "That thing went right on through there (the quarter-mile,) on the rear wheels with no problems. When I returned to the starting line, the crowd was in hysterics!" In the process of becoming the king of the exhibition wheelstanders, Golden pioneered a number of firsts. "The rest of the wheelstanders, which were growing rapidly in numbers, would always say, 'Let Maverick try it, and if it works, then we'll try it,'" Golden boasted.