Howard Hughes

I

Introduction

Howard Hughes (1905-1976), American industrialist, aviator, and motion-picture producer. Hughes’s enormous wealth, intellect, and achievement—combined with his much-publicized reclusive life in his later years—made him one of the most famous men of the mid-20th century. Interest in Hughes was renewed with the 2004 release of The Aviator, a motion picture based on his life, which was directed by Martin Scorsese and starred Leonardo DiCaprio in the title role.

II

Early Years

Born in Houston, Texas, Hughes was the only child of Howard Robard Hughes, Sr., and his wife, Allene Gano Hughes. He grew up amid great wealth and privilege due to his father’s successful business, the Hughes Tool Company. The company had been founded in the early 1900s after his father and a partner received patents for a revolutionary oil-drill bit.

As a child, Hughes showed great aptitude in engineering. At age 11, he erected Houston’s first wireless broadcast set, a communications system that used radio waves to transmit signals and messages across distances. He took his first flying lessons at age 14, establishing his lifelong love of flight.

When he was 16 years old, Hughes’s mother died. Shortly afterward, his father took him to Hollywood, California, and introduced him to show business. Hughes decided then that he wanted to get into the movie industry. When his father died two years later, he inherited the Hughes Tool Company. Hughes soon hired others to oversee the company so he could pursue a career in film.

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III

Hollywood

The success of his father’s tool company enabled Hughes to finance his own movies. Despite the initial skepticism of Hollywood insiders, Hughes produced approximately 40 films from 1926 to 1957. Some of his most acclaimed movies include Hell’s Angels (1930) with Jean Harlow, The Front Page (1931) with Pat O’Brien and Adolphe Menjou, and Scarface (1932), starring Paul Muni. He also ran the film studio RKO Pictures Corporation from 1948 to 1957.

In 1929 Hughes divorced Ella Rice, his wife of four years. He soon afterward dated a number of Hollywood’s most famous actresses, including Katharine Hepburn, Ginger Rogers, and Jean Peters. He married Peters in 1957, but their marriage ended in 1971, as mental illness overcame him in the last decades of his life.

IV

Aviation Hero

Hughes’s other love in life was designing and flying airplanes. He was determined to become a famous aviator. In 1935 he set a speed record of 566 km/h (352 mph) while flying the Silver Bullet, an airplane he designed. The following year he flew from Los Angeles, California, to Newark, New Jersey, in 9 hours 27 minutes, a record at the time for transcontinental flight. In 1937 he bested that record, flying the same distance in 7 hours 28 minutes. But it was his around-the-world flight from July 10 to July 14, 1938, that transformed him into a national hero. Hughes set a new record of 3 days 19 hours 17 minutes.

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