The Hughes H1. One of my all-time favorite prop driven aircraft. It has nearly perfect lines, forms and proportions. You can trace many others designs back to this one; the Zero, Thunderbolt and even the German Focke-Wulf Fw 90. Innovative as hell to boot - first flush rivets and retractable landing gear. The plane set a non-stop cross country record in 1937 - LA to the Big Apple in 7 hours 28 minutes. The plane now resides in DC at the Smithsonian, it's worth the trip. On a sad side note the replica H1 in the color photos was destroyed in a crash in August 2003 near Yellowstone that took the life of it's owner and builder Jim Wright.
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