THE LIFE OF HOWARD HUGHES
Howard Robard Hughes Jr. (1905-1976) was one of America's most fascinating and enigmatic figures: a business mogul, aviation pioneer, Hollywood producer, and one of the world's most famous recluses.
EARLY FORTUNE AND HOLLYWOOD
After both parents died by 1924, Hughes inherited immense wealth from his father's revolutionary oil drilling invention. He dropped out of college to build Hughes Tool Company into a multibillion-dollar empire while simultaneously pursuing filmmaking in Hollywood. His ambitious films pushed boundaries and often lost money, despite earning Academy Award nominations.
AVIATION LEGEND
Hughes' true passion was aviation—including aeronautical engineering and aircraft performance. He advanced the art and science of aviation with innovations, and set multiple world records.
1935: World landplane speed record of 352.46 mph in his self-designed H-1 Racer
1937: Transcontinental flight record of 7 hours, 28 minutes from Los Angeles to Newark
1938: Circled the globe in 91 hours with a four-person crew, beating the previous record by nearly four days
THE CRASH THAT CHANGED EVERYTHING
On July 7, 1946, Hughes's experimental XF-11 aircraft crashed in Beverly Hills after hydraulic failure. The crash left him with devastating injuries: crushed bones, a collapsed lung, and severe burns. Following his recovery, Hughes's behavior became increasingly erratic, driven by worsening Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, chronic pain, and an intense fear of germs.
DESCENT INTO ISOLATION
Hughes retreated to hotel penthouses, rarely leaving his rooms and issuing complex instructions for handling everyday objects. His servants had to wrap spoon handles in multiple layers of tissue and cellophane before he would touch them. In his final decade, he worked for days without sleep in blackened rooms, survived on a meager diet while battling codeine addiction, and stopped cutting his fingernails.
PERSONAL LIFE
Hughes's relationships included brief marriages and affairs with Hollywood actresses. He married Ella Botts Rice in 1925 and largely ignored her while pursuing stars like Billie Dove and Jean Harlow. His second marriage to actress Jean Peters (1957-1971) remained shrouded in secrecy. He also had a notable romance with the fiercely independent Katharine Hepburn.
When Hughes died in 1976, his body was so emaciated and unrecognizable that he had to be identified by fingerprints: a tragic end to one of history's most paradoxical figures.
