The Daring Legacy of the Hughes H-1 Racer

Ride along on a Microsoft Flight Simulator journey through history in Howard Hughes' speed-record aircraft.

Patrick Chovanec

Friday, June 23, 2023 at 02:24 PM ET

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[Image courtesy Patrick Chovanec]

Key Takeaways:

The Hughes H-1 Racer was a revolutionary, custom-built aircraft created by Howard Hughes in 1934 with the sole purpose of setting world speed records.
Designed with an obsessive focus on streamlining, the H-1 incorporated advanced features for its era, including a powerful Pratt & Whitney Twin Wasp Junior engine, retractable landing gear, flaps, and flush rivets.
Howard Hughes personally piloted the H-1 Racer to break the world landplane speed record in 1935, averaging 352.39 mph, and later set a new transcontinental speed record in 1937.
Despite its limited operational hours and not becoming a fighter plane, the H-1 Racer stands as a testament to pre-WWII aviation innovation and solidified Hughes' reputation as a daring aviator and the "fastest man alive" for a period.

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For this session in Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020, I’ll be flying the Hughes H-1 Racer, the superbly streamlined airplane that eccentric tycoon Howard Hughes built and flew to set several world speed records.

The story of this plane really begins in 1908, when Howard’s father, Howard Hughes Sr., patented a new drill bit that proved essential to the oil boom then sweeping Texas. The drill bit business generated money like a gushing oil derrick. Hughes Sr. moved his family to Los Angeles, where his brother (junior’s uncle) was a successful screenwriter for the fledgling movie industry, interested to get in on the action.