James “Jim” Bede, the sometimes-controversial airplane designer who created more than a dozen airplanes types since the 1960s — including the Bede BD-5J micro jet that appeared in a James Bond film — died on July 9 in Cleveland, Ohio. He was 82.
Born in Cleveland in April 1933, Bede graduated from Wichita State University in Kansas with a degree in aeronautical engineering. He briefly joined North American Aviation, but left the company in 1961 to found his own aircraft design firm. The BD-1 kitplane, which became the low-wing American Aviation AA1 Yankee Clipper, was his first design.
