Gus McLeod

Gus McLeod (born 1954) is an African American pilot and author whose exploits have been featured in reality television appearances. He was the first person to fly around the North Pole in an open-cockpit biplane.

Biography

McLeod grew up in Corinth, Mississippi, the son of a Methodist minister. McLeod is a 1976 graduate of The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C.

On Apr 17, 2000, he became the first person to fly around the North Pole in an open-cockpit biplane.

McLeod is an entrepreneur who, in 2004, lived in Laytonsville, Maryland. However in 2004 he was also reported to live in Gaithersburg, Maryland.

McLeod is working with Florida Atlantic University and the Federal Aviation Administration to create a course on aviation history for middle schools.

He has a wife, Mary, and three children, including Hera, who competed with him in The Amazing Race 6.

McLeod was featured in a four-column article in the Smithsonian (magazine) because he planned to fly his "...Beech 18 solo from the South Pole to the North Pole, a 32,000 mile trip, in about two months" (Smithsonian).

The UK aeronautic company Cobham plc reports in an employee newsletter that McLeod is a former CIA chemist, and is currently a businessman based in Maryland.

Works

• Solo to the Top of the World: Gus McLeod's Daring Record Flight, 2003, 245 pages ISBN 1-58834-102-X

Appearances

• Television — Inside Base Camp: Tori Murden and Gus McLeod, 2002
• Television — The Amazing Race 6, Nov 14, 2004

Bibliography

• Smithsonian magazine, April 2003, pg 42 Flight of Fancy

External links

• Gus McLeod at the Internet Movie Database
• Update 19 January 2004
• PR newswire update November 2005