By Sam Oleson
Nearly a quarter of a century ago, the late Jim Moss set out to complete a massive project, literally and figuratively. He was going to build one of the most iconic air racers ever designed — the Gee Bee R-6H QED.
Originally built in 1934 by Granville Brothers Aircraft of Springfield, Massachusetts, the R-6 was designed for high-altitude and long-distance flight (at least for the 1930s). Powered by a 700-hp Pratt & Whitney Hornet engine, the QED was purchased by Floyd B. Odlum for his future wife, Jackie Cochran, and shipped to England to compete in the the 1934 London to Melbourne, Australia, race. Unfortunately, the airplane experienced mechanical problems and was unable to finish the race, and Cochran ended up selling the airplane.
Trading hands a couple of times, the QED eventually ended up in Mexico with Francisco Sarabia, who competed in a Mexico City to New York City race in 1939, winning in 10 hours and 43 minutes. Tragically, on his return trip to Mexico, Sarabia decided to make a stop in Washington, D.C., and experienced an engine failure that forced him to crash land in the Potomac River, an incident that he did not survive. The airplane was recovered from the river and sent to Sarabia’s hometown in Mexico, and is currently on display at Museo Francisco Sarabia in Ciudad Lerdo, Durango.
In 2002, Jim began his build of the Gee Bee R-6H “Super QED II,” which took him and his volunteer team until 2013 to finish. Jim made some modifications to the original design along the way, increasing the wing, vertical stabilizer, and rudder surface areas, as well as spreading the landing gear two feet further apart and installing a 1,400-hp Wright R-1820 engine. Sadly, Jim died two weeks before his airplane first flew in 2014. The Super QED visited EAA AirVenture Oshkosh in 2014 and was placed on display at Paine Field, Washington, later that year.
In 2023, the Mid America Flight Museum, located in Mount Pleasant, Texas, purchased the airplane and transported it to its restoration shop at Grimes Field in Urbana, Ohio. Led by Mid America Flight Museum Restoration Manager Doug Smith, EAA 540107, a team of museum staff and dedicated volunteers worked to return the QED to airworthy status.
“The airplane had to leave the premises [at Paine Field], and so the wings were taken off of it and it moved to Arlington, Washington, and was put in a gentleman’s T-hangar,” Doug explained during a Vintage in Review presentation on Monday. “And I think at this point, the [Moss] family was ready to part with the airplane. And Kelly [Mahon] and I both worked for Mid America Flight Museum. The price finally got to the point where the gentleman we worked for, Scott Glover, decided he wanted to purchase the airplane. And so he called me one day out of the blue and said, ‘Hey, Doug, I just bought a new airplane.’ I said, ‘Well, that’s fantastic. What’d we get?’ He said, ‘It’s big, red, and white.’ I went, ‘You got the QED, didn’t you?’”
Doug mentioned that there were a few issues with the airplane he knew would need to be addressed, notably the canopy, landing gear, and balancing the ailerons.
“Once we got into the airplane a little bit, we found some things that we wanted to modify,” Doug explained. “So we made a whole new canopy system for the Gee Bee. The landing gear was quite extensive. So there’s a spreader bar between the landing gear down here. And many, many people ask, especially if you have opinions on the internet, and there’s lots of those, ‘Why in the world did you put that there?’ Well, if you … look at the pictures of the original R-6 down in Mexico, it has the spreader bar between the landing gear. It’s the only Gee Bee that has one of those. And the size of the airplane and the way the landing gear articulates, it needs that spreader bar.”
The QED made its first postrestoration flight on May 12, 2026, with Mid America Flight Museum Director of Operations Kelly Mahon, EAA 571419, at the controls.
“Let’s first just say it’s a very nice-flying airplane,” Kelly said. “We had a lot of concern. It’s a Gee Bee. There’s nothing good we can say about [original] Gee Bees for stability or anything like that. They’re always beautiful. We had to look at this one a little bit different. The history was different. Multiple pilots had flown the airplane successfully, and the airplane never had any structural failures or problems. We felt like we were starting with something good.
“I also have a lot of faith in Doug. We’ve done a bunch of first flights together. And he takes airplanes that are nice and takes them to fantastic. So let’s start with a good airplane. Let’s have Doug go through it. I think that we’re going to have a good airplane. We always had questions. We were always concerned. But it really didn’t take three minutes after takeoff to realize we had an airplane. And I think it was five minutes into the flight and I made a high-speed pass down the taxiway.”
Kelly and the QED arrived at EAA AirVenture Oshkosh 2026 on Sunday evening. For those interested in getting an up-close look at this art deco masterpiece, the airplane is parked near the Vintage Red Barn just south of Boeing Plaza.