Yeah! In addition to it being a radio show plot (10-18-42, and a bit thereafter), Jack actually did some publicity for the scrap drives to offset the then-current steel shortage, including actually finding a real Maxwell, and doing the stunt of taking it in for scrap for newsreels.
We kinda forget that the Maxwell was a war casualty, and disappeared for a good while, until it would mysteriously resurface in the show much, much later (I think 1949 definitively, according to 39 Forever) without explanation.