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Monday, June 6, 2016
Texas History Minute: the military, many of whom Hughes himself helped design. Though generous to friends and employees and known around the world, he became known for his obsessive attention to the smallest detail. While this drive helped him become successful in movies and aviation, it steadily unraveled his personal life. For example, he would only drink Dr. Ken Bridges orange juice he saw freshly Howard Hughes was a man who squeezed himself or arranged once commanded the world’s peas by size. Relationships with attention, sometimes for all the his many girlfriends broke down wrong reasons. His story is one of wealth, power, fame, and the dangers quickly. In 1947, he suffered a mental breakdown, locking of obsession. himself inside his personal movie theater for four months Howard Robard Hughes, Jr., was born in Houston on Christmas Eve, before coming out. 1905. His father, Howard R. Hughes, Sr., was a wealthy inventor In 1953, he established the Howard Hughes Medical and businessman, owner of the Institute through profits from Hughes Tool Company. The Hughes Aircraft. It would younger Hughes was fascinated by science and machinery. By 1917, he continue long after his death and eventually become the largest was one of only a handful of private research institution in the licensed ham radio operators in Southeast Texas. He later built the nation, spending hundreds of millions of dollars each year to first motorcycle in Houston by research all areas of health care himself. In spite of his privileged and medical sciences. upbringing, he faced two He spent the last decade of his heartbreaking tragedies in rapid succession: his mother died in 1922, life living in a series of hotels, having his aides run his followed by his father’s death in companies by telephone and 1924. memo and avoiding any kind of After inheriting his father’s fortune, public appearance. Wild rumors he proved very adept at running the about his condition circulated. When he died in 1976, the once family business and wanted to dashing figure was expand. Fascinated by movies, he unrecognizable, reduced to 90 headed west to become a movie pounds with long, wiry hair, producer. In 1927, he began unkempt beard, and toenails that production of Hell’s Angels, an were inches long. action film taking place in World War I which included recreations of aerial dogfights with dozens of aircraft. He learned to fly while he directed the movie, which at $3.8 million was the most expensive ever made up to that time.
After his death, scores of books and movies about his life abounded. Texas actor Tommy Lee Jones appeared as Hughes in a 1977 TV movie called The Amazing Howard Hughes, while Jason Robards starred as Hughes in an off-beat story about one of his alleged wills making a Nevada gas station attendant a multi-millionaire in Melvin and Howard (1980). Leonardo DiCaprio starred in the 2004 film, The Aviator, which captured the early life and early mental breakdowns of Hughes.
In 1932, he founded Hughes Aircraft. Hughes himself set a speed record of 352 MPH in 1935 in his H1 aircraft. He followed this up in 1938 with a record round-the-world flight of 91 hours. In 1939, he bought TWA Airlines for $7 million, though federal regulators would force him to sell it in 1966 for which he reaped nearly $550 million. In World War II, Hughes Aircraft built Authors and filmmakers alike several different types of plane for tried to unravel the complicated
life of a man who had every creature comfort he ever wanted but spent so many years haunted by inner turmoil. The ultimate answers to those questions died with Hughes. In the end, no matter how much Howard Hughes tried to ignore the world, the world could not ignore him. Dr. Bridges is a Texas native, writer, and history professor. He can be reached at drkenbridges@gmail.com.
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