- Born
- Died
- Birth nameHoward Robard Hughes Jr.
- Nicknames
- The World's Greatest Womanizer
- Sonny
- Height6′ 4″ (1.93 m)
- Billionaire businessman, film producer, film director, and aviator, born in Humble, Texas just north of Houston. He studied at two prestigious institutions of higher learning: Rice University in Houston and California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, California. Inherited his father's machine tool company in 1923. In 1926 he ventured into films, producing Hell's Angels (1930), Scarface (1932) and The Outlaw (1943). He also founded his own aircraft company, designed, built and flew his own aircraft, and broke several world air speed records (1935-1938). His most famous aircraft, the Hercules (nicknamed "The Spruce Goose"), which was as he discovered, an under-powered wooden seaplane designed to carry 750 passengers. That plane was completed in 1947, but flew only once over a distance of one mile despite having eight Pratt & Whitney Wasp Major engines, among the most powerful radial piston engines of the day. Throughout his life he shunned publicity, eventually becoming a recluse but still controlling his vast business interests from sealed-off hotel suites, and giving rise to endless rumors and speculation. In 1971 an "authorized" biography was announced, but the authors wound up in prison for fraud, and the mystery surrounding him continued until his death in Houston. He is buried in Glenwood Cemetery, Houston
- IMDb mini biography by: Lester A Dinerstein with smoothing out by Brian Daly
- SpousesJean Peters(January 12, 1957 - June 18, 1971) (divorced)Ella Rice(June 1, 1925 - December 9, 1929) (divorced)
- ParentsAllene Hughes (Gano)Howard R. Hughes Sr.
- RelativesRupert Hughes(Aunt or Uncle)
- He bought Las Vegas television station KLAS (Channel 8), so that he could watch movies into the night. If he fell asleep during a film, he would call up the station and order that the scene he missed be replayed.
- In public he would often speak with his hand covering his mouth, for fear of being lip-read.
- On July 7, 1946, Rosemary DeCamp and her husband were in their house in Beverly Hills, California, when an aircraft piloted by Hughes crashed into the roof of the house next door, and its wing was torn off and sliced through the roof of her house, landing in the bedroom, where she and her husband were. The plane, an experimental model Hughes had developed called the XF-11, had experienced propeller reversal on the right engine after taking off from the airport at nearby Culver City. It finally came to rest after crashing through the wall of the house of another of DeCamp's neighbors and exploding. Hughes was rescued from the cockpit by Marine Sgt,. William Lloyd Durkin. Hughes was severely injured with a broken leg, multiple cracked ribs on his left side, a dislodged heart, a fractured skull, burns and abrasions over 65% of his body. He was given a 50-50 chance to survive. He paid for the damage to the houses in the neighborhood out of his own pocket and sent Durkin a weekly paycheck until the day he died.
- It has variously been hypothesized that his crazed behavior in his later reclusive years was caused by brain damage resulting from a series of accidents; OCD; bipolar disorder; or even paranoid-schizophrenia.
- Was Stan Lee's inspiration for Tony Stark, AKA Iron Man. Like Hughes, Stark inherited a business from his father. As a tribute to Hughes, Tony Stark's father was named Howard Stark.
- Every man has his price, or a guy like me couldn't exist.
- I'm not a paranoid deranged millionaire. Goddamit, I'm a billionaire.
- My father told me, "Never have partners".
- We don't have a monopoly. Anyone who wants to dig a well without a Hughes bit can always use a pick and shovel.
- [on Clark Gable] His ears made him look like a taxicab with both doors open.
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