Adolf Hitler paid a visit on Mannerheim’s 75th anniversary on 4 June 1942. One of the purposes of the visit was to strengthen cooperation between Finland and Germany. Hitler presented three Steyr-1500 A/02 off-road vehicles as a birthday present. Two of the cars have disappeared along the years, but one of them has found its way to the Military Museum’s collections. For a few years, the cars were in Mannerheim’s representational use, but when he became President, he replaced them with the more spacious V12 Packard. 

After the war, the vehicles had been transferred to the Defence Forces by Mannerheim’s estate. The Defence Forces decided to sell them. Passing by a car dismantling company in Hyvinkää, the vehicle was auctioned and ended up in Mäntsälä’s Voluntary Fire Brigade. Before the auction, the car was classified as being “in bad condition”, so as scrap it did not have much monetary value. In Mäntsälä, the car was modified to better meet the needs of the Fire Brigade. The chassis was removed and the engine replaced. The vehicle was used to pump water to extinguish fire, but in hard work the original parts got damaged. No spare parts were available, so the car was decommissioned in 1972, and the Municipality of Mäntsälä donated it to the Military Museum.