Aviator
U.S. Army test pilot Lt. F.W. "Mike" Hunter wearing a flight suit. (Image from the Office of War Information, 1942.)

Louis Blériot in his monoplane.

An aviator is a person who flies an aircraft. The first recorded use of the term (aviateur in French) was in 1887, as a variation of 'aviation', from the Latin avis (meaning bird), coined in 1863 by G. de la Landelle in Aviation Ou Navigation Aérienne (Aviation or Air Navigation). The term aviatrix (aviatrice in French), now archaic, was formerly used for a female aviator.

The term is often applied simply to pilots, but can be extended to include aviation navigators, bombardiers, Weapon Systems Officers, and Electronic Warfare Officers. This should not be confused with the term naval aviator, which refers to crew members in the U.S. Navy, U.S. Marine Corps and U.S. Coast Guard.

The term "aviator", as opposed to "pilot" or other terms, was used more in the early days of aviation, before anyone had ever seen an airplane fly, and it was used to show connotations of bravery and adventure. For example, the editors at the Dayton Herald, (in an article of December 18, 1903) described the Wright brothers' first airplane as thus: "The weight, including the body of the aviator, is slightly over 700 pounds".

To ensure the safety of people in the air as well as on the ground, it soon became a requirement for an aircraft to be under the operational control of a properly trained, certified and current pilot at all times, who is responsible for the safe and legal completion of the flight. The first certificate was delivered by the Aéro-Club de France to Louis Blériot in 1908, followed by Glenn Curtiss, Léon Delagrange, and Robert Esnault-Pelterie. The absolute authority given to the "pilot in command" is derived from that of a ship's captain.^{[citation needed]}

In recognition of the aviators' qualifications and responsibilities, most militaries and many airlines around the world award aviator badges to their pilots, as well as other air crews.

Civilian[link]

Commercial pilots about to land an Airbus airliner.

Civilian pilots fly privately for pleasure, charity, or in pursuance of a business, for non-scheduled commercial air-transport companies, or for airlines. When flying for an airline, pilots are usually referred to as airline pilots, with the pilot in command often referred to as the captain.

United States[link]

In 1930, the Air Commerce Act established pilot licensing requirements for American civil aviation.

Since deregulation in 1978, and to a higher extreme since the turn of the millennium, virtually every passenger carrying airline has slashed their pilot pay scales and benefits in the face of fierce competition from low-cost carriers. Commercial and airline pilot pay can vary widely from company to company and industry to industry. In fact, Southwest Airlines Captains and First Officers both have higher salaries than their counterparts at legacy carriers. As of May 2008, median annual earnings of airline pilots, co-pilots, and flight engineers were $111,680.^[1] However, such salaries represent the upper level of airline pay scales. Salaries at regional airlines can be considerably less – though, according to the Bureau of Labor statistics, median annual earnings of commercial pilots were $65,340, with the middle 50 per cent earning between $45,680 and $89,540.^[1] Pilots making very large salaries are typically senior airline captains, while pilots making very small salaries are generally low-seniority first officers. A large variability in salaries can easily skew an average; thus, the use of median wages to gauge such things as salary. Where large gaps are seen between a median figure, and a lower-bound figure, this usually reflects those who do not stay in that particular field. Viewing this middle ground in context to the upper-bound numbers can give a burgeoning pilot an idea of what to expect if they are able to stay with flying as a full-time career. Based upon voluntary pilot reports, many United States airline pay scales are listed here:^[2]. Most airline pilots are unionized, with the Air Line Pilots Association, International (ALPA)^[3] being the largest pilot labor union in the United States.

In the United States, due to pay-cuts, airline bankruptcies and other industry problems, there are fewer young people who want to make a career out of flying. First-year pilots at AMR Corporation's outsourced operation called AmericanConnection, which is flown by multiple regional partners, would only earn $22,000 a year if they could pick up and fit into their schedule all the extra flying allowed under federal FAA rules.^[4]

Bitterness over pay-cuts, lost pensions and airline management using Chapter 11 Bankruptcy laws to escape previously agreed upon labor contracts is increasingly finding its way into the public eye. In September of 2011, 700 union and non-union pilots marched, in full uniform, at the Occupy Wall Street protests.^[5] The pilots carried signs with images of the partially submerged Airbus piloted by hero, Captian Chesley Sullenberger. The event was later christened The Miracle on the Hudson. After saving the lives of every passenger aboard the stricken airplane, later, Captain Sullenberger testified before Congress that he doesn't know a single professional pilot that wants their children following in their footsteps.^[6]

Commercial airline pilots in the United States have a mandatory retirement age of 65, increased from age 60 in 2007.^[7]

Outside the United States[link]

In some countries, such as Pakistan, Israel, Thailand and several African nations, there is a strong relationship between the military and the principal national airlines, and many airline pilots come from the military; however, that is no longer the case in the United States and Western Europe. While the flight decks of U.S. and European airliners do have ex-military pilots, many pilots are civilians. Military training and flying, while rigorous, is fundamentally different in many ways from civilian piloting. Military pilots are trained to higher regulatory standards than civilian pilots, and while both paths create a safe pilot, civilian pilots are better versed in civilian regulations.

In 2012 in Scandinavia, a commercial aviator refused to aid in deporting an asylum seeker, by demanding that the police officers and the prisoner leave his aircraft, because the aviator had reason to believe that the asylum seeker was awaiting a death penalty in Iran.^{[8][citation needed]}

Military[link]

F-16 pilot in flight

Military pilots fly with the armed forces of a government or nation-state. Their tasks involve combat and non-combat operations, including direct hostile engagements and support operations. Military pilots undergo specialized training, often with weapons. Examples of military pilots include fighter pilots, bomber pilots, transport pilots, UAV pilots, test pilots and astronauts. Military pilots also serve as flight crews on aircraft for government personnel, such as Air Force One and Air Force Two in the United States.

Military pilots are trained with a different syllabus than civilian pilots, which is delivered by military instructors. This is due to the different aircraft, flight goals, flight situations and chains of responsibility. Many military pilots do transfer over to civilian-pilot qualification after they leave the military, and typically their military experience will be used to grant a civilian pilot's license.

Aviator certifications[link]

Pilots are required to go through many hours of training and theoretical study, that differ depending on the country. The first step is acquiring the Private Pilot License (PPL), or Private Pilot Certificate.

The next step in a pilot's progression is either Instrument Rating (IR), or Multi-Engine Rating (MEP) endorsements.

If a professional career or simply professional-level skills are desired, a Commercial Pilot License (CPL) endorsement would also be required. To be the captain of an airliner, one must obtain an Airline Transport Pilot License (ATPL).

Some countries/carriers require/use a Multi Crew Co-operating Certification (MCC).

Aviators in space[link]

In human spaceflight, a "pilot" is someone who directly controls the operation of a spacecraft, while located within the same craft. This term derives directly from the usage of the word "pilot" in aviation, where it is synonymous with "aviator". Note that on the U.S. Space Shuttle, the term "pilot" is analogous to the term "co-pilot" in aviation, as the "commander" has ultimate responsibility for the shuttle.

Female pilots[link]

Beverly Lynn Burns, first woman in the world to captain the Boeing 747 airliner.

Pioneers[link]

Pioneer aviatrices include French, Raymonde de Laroche, the world's first-ever licensed female pilot on March 8, 1910; Belgian, Helene Dutrieu, the first woman to fly a passenger, first woman to win an air race (1910), and first woman to pilot a seaplane (1912); French, Marie Marvingt the first woman to fly solo across the English Channel and the North Sea in a balloon (October 26, 1909) and first woman to fly as a bomber pilot in combat missions (1915); American, Harriet Quimby, the USA's first-ever licensed female pilot in 1911, and the first woman to cross the English Channel by airplane; American Amelia Earhart, the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic (1932); Bessie Coleman, the first person of African-American descent to become a licensed airplane pilot (1921); German, Marga von Etzdorf, first woman to fly for an airline (1927); Opal Kunz, one of the few women to train US Navy fighter pilots during World War II in the Civilian Pilot Training Program; and the British Amy Johnson, the first woman to fly solo from Britain to Australia (1930). Valérie André, a French neurosurgeon and member of the French army, became the first woman to fly a helicopter in combat, while serving in Indochina (1945).

As well as being Turkey's first aviatrix, Sabiha Gökçen, born in 1913, became the world's first female fighter pilot at the age of 23.^[9][10]

In 1979, a Jamaican, Maria Ziadie-Haddad, became one of the first women in the Western Hemisphere to become a commercial jet airline pilot when she was hired by Air Jamaica 1968 Ltd as a B727 Second Officer.^[11]

Soviet Union[link]

The Night Witches, a women-only combat regiment of the Soviet Air Forces, flew harassment bombing and precision bombing missions from 1942 to the end of the World War II.

United States[link]

F-15 Eagle female pilots walking to their jets at Elmendorf Air Force Base, Alaska.

Until the 1970s, aviation had been a traditionally male occupation in the United States. Commerce Department regulations virtually required pilots to have flown in the military to acquire sufficient flight hours, and until the 1970s, the U.S. Air Force and Navy barred women from flying,^[12] thus also preventing them from moving into commercial piloting^{[citation needed]} Despite women being trained by the US Army Air Corps and flying every advanced military aircraft the US built (including every bomber, pursuit plane, and the first jet) during WWII as Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP), this program was disbanded in December 1944 and commercial jobs were not generally available to women, though these highly trained women flew as instructors and pilots for flying services throughout the United States. Women began to enter U.S. major commercial aviation in the 1970s and 1980s, with 1973 seeing the first female pilot at a major U.S. airline, American Airlines, and 1986, seeing the first female captain at a major U.S. airline.^[13] In the 1970s, women began being permitted to fly in the United States Armed Forces for the first time since WWII, beginning with the Navy and the Army in 1974, and then the Air Force in 1976.^[14]

As of 2010, just over 7% of certified civilian pilots (both private and commercial) in the United States were women.^[15]

Israel[link]

The Israeli Air Force's flight academy is open to female pilots. 24 female pilots have completed the course as of 2011.

Japan[link]

In Japan, the first female captain for commercial passenger flights was Ari Fuji, who began flying as captain for JAL Express in July 2010.^[16] Fuji was rejected from admission to Japanese pilot training school on the grounds of being too small (155 cm; standard was previously 163 cm, currently 158 cm (as of spring 2010)), so she got her pilot's license in the United States. There are currently a few other female pilots in Japan, though, as of 2010^[update], no others in a captain role.

See also[link]

	Book: Aviation
Wikipedia books are collections of articles that can be downloaded or ordered in print.

• Air safety
• IMSAFE (mnemonic for pilot's fitness to fly)
• U.S. Women Pilots Statistics 1960–2010
• List of aerospace engineers
• List of aviators
• List of Russian aviators

References[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Aviators

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Aviators in cockpits

Howard Hughes
Born	Howard Robard Hughes, Jr. (1905-12-24)December 24, 1905 Humble, Texas, US
Died	April 5, 1976(1976-04-05) (aged 70) Houston, Texas, US
Alma mater	Rice University (dropped out in 1924)
Occupation	Chairman of Hughes Aircraft
Years active	1926–1976
Net worth	USD $1.5 billion at the time of his death (approximately 1/1190th of US GNP)[1]
Spouse	Ella Rice (m. 1925–1929) «start: (1925)–end+1: (1930)»"Marriage: Ella Rice to Howard Hughes" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Howard_Hughes) Terry Moore (m. 1949–1976) «start: (1949)–end+1: (1977)»"Marriage: Terry Moore to Howard Hughes" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Howard_Hughes) (alleged) Jean Peters (m. 1957–1971) «start: (1957)–end+1: (1972)»"Marriage: Jean Peters to Howard Hughes" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Howard_Hughes)
Signature
Aviation career
Known for	Hughes Aircraft
Famous flights	Transcontinental airspeed record from Los Angeles to New York City (1937), round the world airspeed record (1938)
Awards	Harmon Trophy (1936 and 1938) Collier Trophy (1938) Octave Chanute Award (1940) Congressional Gold Medal (1939)

Howard Robard Hughes, Jr. (December 24, 1905^[2] – April 5, 1976) was an American business magnate, investor, aviator, engineer, film producer, director, and philanthropist. He was one of the wealthiest people in the world. He gained prominence from the late 1920s as a maverick film producer, making big-budget and often controversial films like The Racket (1928), Hell's Angels (1930), Scarface (1932), and The Outlaw (1943). Hughes was one of the most influential aviators in history; he set multiple world air-speed records, built the Hughes H-1 Racer and H-4 "Hercules" (better known to history as the "Spruce Goose" aircraft), and acquired and expanded Trans World Airlines which would later on merge with American Airlines. Hughes is also remembered for his eccentric behavior and reclusive lifestyle in later life, caused in part by a worsening obsessive–compulsive disorder and chronic pain. His legacy is maintained through the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

Early years[link]

Hughes' birthplace is recorded as either Humble or Houston, Texas. The date is also uncertain, though Hughes claimed his birthday was Christmas Eve. A 1941 affidavit birth certificate of Hughes signed by his aunt Annette Gano Lummis and Estelle Boughton Sharp states he was born on December 24, 1905, in Harris County, Texas.^{[N 1]} However, his baptismal record of October 7, 1906, in the parish register of St. John's Episcopal Church, in Keokuk, Iowa, has his birth listed as September 24, 1905, without reference to the place of birth.^{[N 2]}

His parents were Allene Stone Gano (a descendant of Owen Tudor, second husband of Catherine of Valois, Dowager Queen of England)^[3][4] and Howard R. Hughes, Sr. from Missouri of English descent,^[5] who patented the two-cone roller bit, which allowed rotary drilling for petroleum in previously inaccessible places. Howard R. Hughes, Sr. made the shrewd and lucrative decision to commercialize the invention by leasing the bits instead of selling them, and founded the Hughes Tool Company in 1909.

Showing great aptitude in engineering at an early age, Hughes built Houston's first radio transmitter when he was 11 years old.^[6] At 12, he was photographed in the local newspaper as being the first boy in Houston to have a "motorized" bicycle, which he had built himself from parts taken from his father's steam engine.^[7] He was an indifferent student with a liking for mathematics, flying, and things mechanical, taking his first flying lesson at 14 and later auditing math and aeronautical engineering courses at Caltech.^[6][7]

Allene Hughes died in March 1922 from complications of an ectopic pregnancy. In January 1924, Howard Hughes Sr. died of a heart attack. Their deaths apparently inspired Hughes to include the creation of a medical research laboratory in his will that he signed in 1925, at age 19. Because Howard Sr.'s will had not been updated since Allene's death, Hughes inherited 75 percent of the family fortune.^[8] On his 19th birthday, Hughes was declared an emancipated minor, enabling him to take full control of his legacy.^[9]

Hughes was an outstanding and enthusiastic golfer from a young age, often scoring near par figures, and held a handicap of three during his twenties. He played frequently with top players, including Gene Sarazen.^[10] Hughes rarely played competitively, and gradually gave up his interest in the sport.

Hughes dropped out of Rice University shortly after his father's death. On June 1, 1925, he married Ella Botts Rice (1925–1929), daughter of David Rice and Martha Lawson Botts of Houston, Texas. They moved to Los Angeles, where he hoped to make a name for himself making movies.

Hollywood years[link]

This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (March 2010)

His first two films, Everybody's Acting (1927) and Two Arabian Knights (1928), were financial successes, the latter winning the first Academy Award for Best Director of a comedy picture. The Racket (1928) and The Front Page (1931) were also nominated for Academy Awards. Hughes spent US$3.8 million to make the flying film Hell's Angels (1930). He produced another hit, Scarface (1932), a production delayed by censors' concern over its violence. The Outlaw (1943), completed in 1941, which featured Jane Russell, also received considerable attention from industry censors, this time owing to Russell's revealing costumes. Hughes designed a special bra for his leading lady, although Russell decided against wearing the bra because of a mediocre fit.

Hughes' wife returned to Houston in 1929 and filed for divorce. Hughes dated many famous women, including Billie Dove, Bette Davis, Ava Gardner, Olivia de Havilland, Katharine Hepburn, Ginger Rogers and Gene Tierney. He also proposed to Joan Fontaine several times, according to her autobiography No Bed of Roses. Bessie Love was a mistress during his first marriage. Jean Harlow accompanied him to the premiere of Hell's Angels, but Noah Dietrich wrote many years later that the relationship was strictly professional—Hughes personally disliked Harlow. In his 1971 book, Howard: The Amazing Mr. Hughes, Dietrich said that Hughes genuinely liked and respected Jane Russell but never sought romantic involvement with her. According to Russell's autobiography, however, Hughes once tried to bed her after a party. Russell (who was married at the time) refused him and Hughes promised it would never happen again. The two maintained a professional and private friendship for many years. Hughes remained good friends with Tierney who was quoted after his failed attempts to seduce her "I don't think Howard could love anything that did not have a motor in it." Later, when Tierney's daughter Daria was born deaf and blind and with a severe learning disability, due to Tierney's being exposed to rubella during her pregnancy, Hughes saw to it that Daria received the best medical care and paid all expenses.^[11]

On July 11, 1936, Hughes struck and killed a pedestrian named Gabriel S. Meyer with his car, at the corner of 3rd Street and Lorraine in Los Angeles.^[12] Although Hughes was certified as sober at the hospital to which he was taken after the accident, an attending doctor made a note that Hughes had been drinking. A witness to the accident told police that Hughes was driving erratically and too fast, and that Meyer had been standing in the safety zone of a streetcar stop. Hughes was booked on suspicion of negligent homicide and held overnight in jail until his attorney, Neil McCarthy, obtained a writ of habeas corpus for his release pending a coroner's inquest.^[13][14] By the time of the coroner's inquiry, however, the witness had changed his story and claimed that Meyer had moved directly in front of Hughes's car. Nancy Bayly (Watts), who was in the car with Hughes at the time of the accident, corroborates this version. On July 16, 1936, Hughes was held blameless by a coroner's jury at the inquest into Meyer's death.^[15] Hughes told reporters outside the inquiry, "I was driving slowly and a man stepped out of the darkness in front of me."

On January 12, 1957, Hughes married actress Jean Peters. The couple met in the 1940s, before Peters became a film actress.^[16] They had a highly publicized romance in 1947 and there was talk of marriage, but she said she could not combine it with her career.^[17] It was later claimed that Peters was "the only woman [Hughes] ever loved",^[18] and he reportedly had his security officers follow her everywhere even when they were not in a relationship. This was confirmed by actor Max Showalter, who became a close friend of Peters during shooting of Niagara (1953).^[19] Showalter told in an interview that because he frequently met with Peters, Hughes' men threatened to ruin his career if he did not leave her alone.^[19]

Aviation[link]

Hughes was a lifelong aircraft enthusiast and pilot. At Rogers Airport in Los Angeles, he learned to fly from pioneer aviators, including Moye Stephens. He set many world records and commissioned the construction of custom aircraft to be built for himself while heading Hughes Aircraft at the airport in Glendale. Operating from there, the most technologically important aircraft he commissioned was the Hughes H-1 Racer. On September 13, 1935, Hughes, flying the H-1, set the landplane airspeed record of 352 mph (566 km/h) over his test course near Santa Ana, California (Giuseppe Motta reached 362 mph in 1929 and George Stainforth reached 407.5 mph in 1931, both in seaplanes). A year and a half later, on January 19, 1937, flying a redesigned H-1 Racer featuring extended wings, Hughes set a new transcontinental airspeed record by flying non-stop from Los Angeles to Newark in 7 hours, 28 minutes and 25 seconds (beating his own previous record of 9 hours, 27 minutes). His average ground speed over the flight was 322 mph (518 km/h).^[20]

The H-1 Racer featured a number of design innovations: it had retractable landing gear (as Boeing Monomail had five years before) and all rivets and joints set flush into the body of the aircraft to reduce drag. The H-1 Racer is thought to have influenced the design of a number of World War II fighters such as the Mitsubishi Zero, the Focke-Wulf Fw 190 and the F8F Bearcat;^[21] although that has never been reliably confirmed. The H-1 Racer was donated to the Smithsonian in 1975 and is on display at the National Air and Space Museum.

On July 10, 1938, Hughes set another record by completing a flight around the world in just 91 hours (3 days, 19 hours), beating the previous record by more than four hours. Taking off from New York City, he continued to Paris, Moscow, Omsk, Yakutsk, Fairbanks, Minneapolis, and continued to New York City. For this flight he flew a Lockheed Super Electra (a twin-engine transport with a four-man crew) fitted with all of the latest radio and navigational equipment. Hughes wanted the flight to be a triumph of technology, illustrating that safe, long-distance air travel was possible. In 1938, the William P. Hobby Airport in Houston, Texas, known at the time as Houston Municipal Airport, was renamed Howard Hughes Airport, but the name was changed back after people objected to naming the airport after a living person.

He also had a role in the design and financing of both the Boeing 307 Stratoliner and Lockheed L-049 Constellation.^[22]

Hughes received many awards as an aviator, including the Harmon Trophy in 1936 and 1938, the Collier Trophy in 1938, the Octave Chanute Award in 1940, and a special Congressional Gold Medal in 1939 "in recognition of the achievements of Howard Hughes in advancing the science of aviation and thus bringing great credit to his country throughout the world." According to his obituary in The New York Times, Hughes never bothered to come to Washington to pick up the Congressional Gold Medal. It was eventually mailed to him by President Harry S. Truman.

Hughes D-2 and XF-11[link]

The Hughes D-2 was conceived in 1939 as a bomber with five crew members, powered by 42-cylinder Wright R-2160 Tornado engines. In the end it appeared as two-person fighter-reconnaissance aircraft designated the D-2A, powered by two Pratt & Whitney R-2800-49 engines. The aircraft was constructed using the Duramold process. The prototype was brought to Harper's Dry Lake California in great secrecy in 1943 and first flew on June 20 of that year.^[23] In November 1944, the hangar containing the D-2A was hit by lightning and the aircraft was destroyed. The design of the D-2 led to the Hughes XF-11. The XF-11 was an all-metal, two place reconnaissance aircraft, powered by two Pratt & Whitney R-4360-31 engines, each driving a set of contra-rotation propellers.

Near-fatal crash of the Sikorsky S-43[link]

In the spring of 1943 Hughes spent nearly a month in Las Vegas, test flying his Sikorsky S-43 amphibian aircraft, practicing touch-and-go landings on Lake Mead in preparation for flying the H-4 Hercules. The weather conditions at the lake during the day were ideal and he enjoyed Las Vegas at night. On May 17, 1943, Hughes flew the Sikorsky from California carrying two CAA aviation inspectors, two of his employees and actress Ava Gardner. Hughes dropped Gardner off in Las Vegas and proceeded to Lake Mead to conduct qualifying tests in the S-43. The test flight did not go well. The Sikorsky crashed killing CAA inspector Ceco Cline and Hughes employee Richard Felt. Hughes suffered a severe gash on the top of his head when he hit the upper control panel and had to be rescued by one of the others on board.^[24] Hughes paid divers $100,000 to raise the aircraft and later spent more than $500,000 restoring the aircraft.^[25]

Near-fatal crash of the XF-11[link]

1946 newsreel

Hughes was involved in a near-fatal aircraft accident on July 7, 1946, while piloting the experimental U.S. Army Air Force reconnaissance aircraft, the XF-11, over Los Angeles. An oil leak caused one of the contra-rotating propellers to reverse pitch, causing the aircraft to yaw sharply. Hughes tried to save the craft by landing it at the Los Angeles Country Club golf course, but just seconds before he could reach his attempted destination, the XF-11 started to drop dramatically and crashed in the Beverly Hills neighborhood surrounding the country club.^[26]

When the XF-11 finally came to a halt after destroying three houses, the fuel tanks exploded, setting fire to the aircraft and a nearby home at 808 North Whittier Drive, owned by Lt Col. Charles E. Meyer.^[27] Hughes managed to pull himself out of the flaming wreckage but lay beside the aircraft until he was rescued by Marine Master Sergeant William L. Durkin, who happened to be in the area visiting friends. Hughes sustained significant injuries in the crash, including a crushed collar bone, multiple cracked ribs,^[28] crushed chest with collapsed left lung, shifting his heart to the right side of the chest cavity, and numerous third-degree burns. A oft-told story said that Hughes sent a check to the Marine weekly for the remainder of his life as a sign of gratitude. However, Durkin's daughter denied that he took any money for the rescue.^[29]

However, Hughes was proud that his mind was still working. As he lay in his hospital bed, he decided that he did not like the bed's design. He called in plant engineers to design a "tailor-made" bed, equipped with hot and cold running water, built in six sections, and operated by 30 electric motors, with push-button adjustments.^[30] The hospital bed was designed by Hughes specifically to alleviate the pain caused by moving with severe burn injuries. Despite the fact that he never had the chance to use the bed that he designed, Hughes's bed served as a prototype for the modern hospital bed in common usage today.^[31] Hughes's recovery was considered by his doctors to be almost miraculous. Hughes, however, believed that neither miracle nor modern medicine contributed to his recovery. Instead he vigorously believed that the natural life-giving properties of fresh squeezed orange juice (Hughes would only drink orange juice that had been squeezed before his eyes) were responsible for his rapid recovery.^[31]

Many attribute his long-term addiction to opiates to his use of codeine^[32] as a painkiller during his convalescence. The trademark mustache he wore afterward was used to hide a scar on his upper lip resulting from the accident.^[33]

H-4 Hercules[link]

The Hughes H-4 Hercules with Howard Hughes at the controls

The Spruce Goose test plane in Brazoria County Airport in Texas

Brazoria County Airport Texas: The S-43 Sikorsky test plane

The Hughes H-4 Hercules was originally contracted by the U.S. government for use during World War II to transport troops and equipment across the Atlantic as an alternative to sea-going troop transport ships that were vulnerable to German U-boats. However the aircraft was not completed until after the end of World War II. The concept for the Hercules was originally conceived by industrialist Henry J. Kaiser, who teamed with Hughes to build the aircraft.

The Hercules was the world's largest flying boat, the largest aircraft made from wood,^[34] and, at 319 feet 11 inches (97.51 m), had the longest wingspan of any aircraft (the next largest wingspan is about 30 ft (9 m) shorter). (The Hercules is no longer the longest or heaviest aircraft ever built; both of those titles are currently held by the Antonov An-225.)

The Hercules flew only once for one mile (1.6 km), and 70 feet (21m) above the water, with Hughes at the controls, on November 2, 1947.

The Hercules was nicknamed the "Spruce Goose" by critics, but was actually made largely from birch (not from spruce), rather than of aluminum, because the contract required the aircraft to be built of "non-strategic materials." It was built in Hughes's Westchester, California facility. Howard Hughes was summoned to testify before the Senate War Investigating Committee to explain why the aircraft had not been delivered to the United States Army Air Forces during the war, but the committee disbanded without releasing a final report. After display at the Long Beach, California harbor, the aircraft was moved to McMinnville, Oregon, where it is now part of the Evergreen Aviation Museum.^[35]

Hughes Aircraft[link]

Hughes Aircraft Company, a division of Hughes Tool Company, was originally founded by Hughes in 1932, in a rented corner of a Lockheed Aircraft Corporation hangar in Burbank, California, to build the H-1 racer. During and after World War II, Hughes fashioned his company into a major defense contractor. The Hughes Helicopters division started in 1947 when helicopter manufacturer Kellett sold their latest design to Hughes for production.

In 1948, Hughes created a new division of the company, the Hughes Aerospace Group. The Hughes Space and Communications Group and the Hughes Space Systems Division were later spun off in 1948 to form their own divisions and ultimately became the Hughes Space and Communications Company in 1961. In 1953, Howard Hughes gave all his stock in the Hughes Aircraft Company to the newly formed Howard Hughes Medical Institute, thereby turning the aerospace and defense contractor into a tax-exempt charitable organization. The Howard Hughes Medical Institute sold Hughes Aircraft in 1985 to General Motors for US$5.2 billion. In 1997, General Motors sold Hughes Aircraft to Raytheon and in 2000, sold Hughes Space & Communications to Boeing. A combination of Boeing, GM and Raytheon acquired the Hughes Research Laboratories.

Airlines[link]

In 1939, at the urging of Jack Frye, president of TWA, Hughes quietly purchased a majority share of TWA stock for nearly US$7 million and took control of the airline. Upon assuming ownership, Hughes was prohibited by federal law from building his own aircraft. Seeking an aircraft that would perform better than TWA's fleet of Boeing 307 Stratoliners, Hughes approached Boeing's competitor, Lockheed. Hughes had a good relationship with Lockheed since they had built the aircraft he used in his record flight around the world in 1938. Lockheed agreed to Hughes's request that the new aircraft be built in secrecy. The result was the revolutionary Constellation and TWA purchased the first 40 of the new airliners off the production line.

In 1956, Hughes placed an order for 63 Convair 880s for TWA at a cost of US$400 million. Although Hughes was extremely wealthy at this time, outside creditors demanded that Hughes relinquish control of TWA in return for providing the money. In 1960, Hughes was ultimately forced out of TWA, although he owned 78% of the company and battled to regain control.

Before Hughes' removal, the TWA jet financing issue precipitated the end of Hughes' relationship with Noah Dietrich. Dietrich claimed Hughes developed a plan by which Hughes Tool Company profits were to be inflated in order to sell the company for a windfall that would pay the bills for the 880s. Dietrich agreed to go to Texas to implement the plan on the condition that Hughes agreed to a capital gains arrangement he had long promised Dietrich. When Hughes balked, Dietrich resigned immediately. "Noah," Dietrich quoted Hughes as replying, "I cannot exist without you!" Dietrich stood firm and eventually had to sue to retrieve personal possessions from his office after Hughes ordered it locked.

In 1966, Hughes was forced by a U.S. federal court to sell his shares in TWA because of concerns over conflict of interest between his ownership of both TWA and Hughes Aircraft. The sale of his TWA shares netted him a profit of US$547 million. During the 1970s, Hughes went back into the airline business, buying the airline Air West and renaming it Hughes Airwest.

RKO[link]

In 1948, Hughes gained control of RKO, a struggling major Hollywood studio, by acquiring 25 percent of the outstanding stock from Floyd Odlum's Atlas Corporation. Within weeks of taking control, he dismissed three-quarters of the work force and production was shut down for six months in 1949 while he undertook the investigation of the politics of all remaining studio employees. Completed pictures would be sent back for re-shooting if he felt his star (especially female) was not properly presented, or if a film's anti-communist politics were not sufficiently clear. In 1952, an abortive sale to a Chicago-based group with no experience in the industry disrupted studio operations even further.

Hughes sold the RKO theaters in 1953 as settlement of the United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc. antitrust case. With the sale of the profitable theaters, the shaky status of the film studio became increasingly apparent. A steady stream of lawsuits from RKO's minority shareholders, charging him with financial misconduct and corporate mismanagement, became an increasing nuisance, especially because Hughes wanted to focus on his aircraft-manufacturing and TWA holdings during the Korean War years. Eager to be rid of the distraction, Hughes offered to buy out all other stockholders.

By the end of 1954, at a cost of nearly US$24 million, he had gained near total control of RKO, becoming the closest thing to a sole owner of a Hollywood studio seen in three decades. Six months later, Hughes sold the studio to the General Tire and Rubber Company for US$25 million. Hughes retained the rights to pictures he had personally produced, including those made at RKO. He also retained Jane Russell's contract. For Howard Hughes, this was the virtual end of his 25-year involvement in motion pictures; though he had all but destroyed a major Hollywood studio, his reputation as a financial wizard emerged unscathed. He reportedly walked away from RKO having made US$6.5 million in personal profit.^[36]

General Tire was interested mainly in exploiting the value of the RKO library for television programming, though it made some attempts to continue producing films. After a year and a half of mixed success, General Tire shut down film production at RKO for good at the end of January 1957. The studio lots in Hollywood and Culver City were sold to Desilu Productions later that year for US$6.15 million.

Howard Hughes Medical Institute[link]

In 1953, Hughes launched the Howard Hughes Medical Institute in Miami, Florida, and currently located in Chevy Chase, Maryland, formed with the express goal of basic biomedical research, including trying to understand, in Hughes' words, the "genesis of life itself." Hughes' first will, which he signed in 1925 at the age of 19, stipulated that a portion of his estate should be used to create a medical institute bearing his name.^[37] When a major battle with the IRS loomed ahead, Hughes gave all his stock in the Hughes Aircraft Company to the institute, thereby turning the aerospace and defense contractor into a for-profit entity of a fully tax-exempt charity. Hughes' internist, Dr. Verne Mason, who treated Hughes after his 1946 plane crash, was chairman of the institute's medical advisory committee.^[38] The Howard Hughes Medical Institute's new board of trustees sold Hughes Aircraft in 1985 to General Motors for US$5.2 billion, allowing the institute to grow dramatically.

The deal was the topic of a protracted legal battle between Hughes and the Internal Revenue Service, which Hughes ultimately won. After his death in 1976, many thought that the balance of Hughes' estate would go to the institute, although it was ultimately divided among his cousins and other heirs, given the lack of a will to the contrary. The HHMI was the 4th largest private organization as of 2007^[39] and the largest devoted to biological and medical research, with an endowment of US$16.3 billion as of June 2007.

Nixon scandal[link]

Shortly before the 1960 Presidential election, Richard Nixon was harmed by revelations of a US$205,000 loan from Hughes to Nixon's brother Donald. It has long been speculated that Nixon's drive to learn what the Democrats were planning in 1972 was based in part on his belief that the Democrats knew about a later bribe that his friend Bebe Rebozo had received from Hughes after Nixon took office.

In late 1971, Donald Nixon was collecting intelligence for his brother in preparation for the upcoming presidential election. One of Donald's sources was John H. Meier,^[40] a former business adviser of Hughes who had also worked with Democratic National Chairman Larry O'Brien.

However, Meier, in collaboration with former Vice President of the United States Hubert Humphrey and others, wanted to feed misinformation to the Nixon campaign. Meier told Donald that he was sure the Democrats would win the election because Larry O’Brien had a great deal of information on Richard Nixon’s illicit dealings with Howard Hughes that had never been released;^[41][42] O’Brien didn’t actually have any such information, but Meier wanted Nixon to think he did. Donald told his brother that O’Brien was in possession of damaging Hughes information that could destroy his campaign.^[43] Terry Lenzner, who was the chief investigator for the Senate Watergate Committee, speculates that it was Nixon's desire to know what O'Brien knew about Nixon's dealings with Hughes that may have partially motivated the Watergate break-in.^[44]

[edit] Glomar Explorer

In 1972, Hughes was approached by the CIA to help secretly recover Soviet submarine K-129 which had sunk near Hawaii four years earlier. Thus, the special-purpose salvage vessel Glomar Explorer was born. Hughes' involvement provided the CIA with a plausible cover story, having to do with civilian marine research at extreme depths and the mining of undersea manganese nodules. In the summer of 1974, Glomar Explorer attempted to raise the Soviet vessel.^[45]

However, during the recovery a mechanical failure in the ship's grapple caused half of the submarine to break off and fall to the ocean floor. This section is believed to have held many of the most sought-after items, including its code book and nuclear missiles. Two nuclear-tipped torpedoes and some cryptographic machines were recovered, along with the bodies of six Soviet submariners who were subsequently given formal burial at sea in a filmed ceremony. The operation, known as Project Azorian (but incorrectly referred to by the press as Project Jennifer), became public in February 1975 because burglars had obtained secret documents from Hughes' headquarters in June 1974.^[46] Though he lent his name to the operation, Hughes and his companies had no actual involvement in the project.

Mental illness and physical decline[link]

This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (November 2009)

As early as the 1930s, Hughes displayed signs of mental illness, primarily obsessive-compulsive disorder. Close friends reported that he was obsessed with the size of peas, one of his favorite foods, and used a special fork to sort them by size.

While directing The Outlaw, Hughes became fixated on a minor flaw in one of Jane Russell's blouses, claiming that the fabric bunched up along a seam and gave the appearance of two nipples on each breast. He was reportedly so upset by the matter that he wrote a detailed memorandum to the crew on how to fix the problem. Richard Fleischer, who directed His Kind of Woman with Hughes as executive producer, wrote at length in his autobiography about the difficulty of dealing with the tycoon. In his book, Just Tell Me When to Cry, Fleischer explained that Hughes was fixated on trivial details and was alternately indecisive and obstinate. He also revealed that Hughes' unpredictable mood swings made him wonder if the film would ever be completed.

In December 1957, Hughes told his aides that he wanted to screen some movies at a film studio near his home. Hughes stayed in the studio's darkened screening room for more than four months, never leaving. He subsisted exclusively on chocolate bars, chicken, and milk, and relieved himself in the empty bottles and containers. He was surrounded by dozens of Kleenex boxes, which he continuously stacked and re-arranged. He wrote detailed memos to his aides on yellow legal pads giving them explicit instructions not to look at him, to respond when spoken to, but otherwise not speak to him. Throughout this period, Hughes sat fixated in his chair, often naked, continuously watching movies, reel after reel, day after day. When he finally emerged in the spring of 1958, his hygiene was terrible, as he had not bathed or cut his hair and nails for weeks (although this may have been due to allodynia - pain upon being touched^[32]). The Screening Room was located at Sunset Boulevard and Doheny Drive in Los Angeles; it was owned by Martin Nosseck and was called the "Martin Nosseck Projection Theatre" - Martin Nosseck was the full time projectionist for Hughes during that time.

After the screening room incident, Hughes moved into a bungalow at the Beverly Hills Hotel. He also rented out several other rooms for his aides, his wife, and his numerous girlfriends. His erratic behavior continued, however, as he would sit naked in his bedroom with a pink hotel napkin placed over his genitals, watching movies. In one year, he spent an estimated $11 million at the hotel.

In a bout of obsession with his home state, Hughes began purchasing all restaurant chains and four star hotels that had been founded within the borders of Texas. This included, if for only a short period, many unknown franchises currently out of business. Ownership of the restaurants was placed in the hands of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and all licenses were resold shortly after.

Another time, he became obsessed with the 1968 film Ice Station Zebra and had it running on a continuous loop in his home. According to his aides, he watched it 150 times.^[47]

Hughes insisted on using tissues to pick up objects, so that he could insulate himself from germs. He would also notice dust, stains or other imperfections on people's clothes and demand that they take care of it.

Once one of the most visible men in America, Hughes ultimately vanished from public view, although the tabloids continued to follow rumors of his behavior and whereabouts. He was reported to be terminally ill, mentally unstable or even dead.

As a result of numerous plane crashes, Hughes spent much of his later life in pain, eventually becoming severely addicted to codeine, which he injected intramuscularly.^[32] Hughes only had his hair cut and nails trimmed once a year. He may have been in severe chronic pain from his extensive injuries, so much so that even the act of tooth brushing was painful, so he avoided it.^[32]

A retrospective case study suggests that Hughes' drug situation is more reminiscent of "pseudoaddiction" than true addiction; he suffered chronic pain and used narcotic medicine to control it.^[32] He did not inject it intravenously for immediate effect, rather, he injected it into muscle, where it would have more of an effect on pain,^[32] however it should be noted that codeine, when injected intravenously, leads to life threatening symptoms and is not by any means a safe route of administration, under any circumstance.^[48] He did not use tobacco or other drugs, and rarely consumed alcohol.^[32] He used diazepam to control the symptoms of withdrawal when he had not taken enough codeine.^[32] At the time, the field of pain management was small and there were few options for long-term pain control.^[32] As codeine is a relatively weak narcotic, his pain was probably not controlled effectively.^[32]

Toward the end of his life, his inner circle was largely composed of Mormons, as they were the only people he considered trustworthy, even though Hughes himself was not a member of their church.

Hughes equipped this 1954 Chrysler New Yorker with an aircraft-grade air filtration system which took up the entire trunk

Las Vegas baron and recluse[link]

The wealthy and aging Howard Hughes, accompanied by his entourage of personal aides, began moving from one hotel to another, always taking up residence in the top floor penthouse. During the last ten years of his life, from 1966 to 1976, Hughes lived in hotels in Beverly Hills, Boston, Las Vegas, Nassau, Freeport, Vancouver,^[49] London, Managua, Acapulco, and others.

On November 24, 1966 (Thanksgiving Day),^[50] Hughes arrived in Las Vegas by railroad car and moved into the Desert Inn. Because he refused to leave the hotel and to avoid further conflicts with the owners of the hotel, Hughes bought the Desert Inn in early 1967. The hotel's eighth floor became the nerve center of his empire and the ninth-floor penthouse became Hughes' personal residence. Between 1966 and 1968, Hughes bought several other hotels/casinos such as the Castaways, New Frontier, The Landmark Hotel and Casino, and the Sands. He bought the small Silver Slipper casino only to reposition the hotel's trademark neon silver slipper, visible from Hughes bedroom, which apparently had been keeping him up at night. An unusual incident marked an earlier Hughes connection to Las Vegas: during his 1954 engagement at the Last Frontier hotel in Las Vegas, flamboyant entertainer Liberace mistook Howard Hughes for his lighting director, instructing him to instantly bring up a blue light should he start to play Clair de lune. Hughes nodded in compliance. Then the hotel's entertainment director arrived to properly introduce Hughes to Liberace.^[51]

Hughes wanted to change the image of Las Vegas to something more glamorous than it was. As Hughes wrote in a memo to an aide, "I like to think of Las Vegas in terms of a well-dressed man in a dinner jacket and a beautifully jeweled and furred female getting out of an expensive car." Hughes bought several local television stations (including KLAS-TV).

Hughes' considerable business holdings were overseen by a small panel unofficially dubbed "The Mormon Mafia" because of the many Latter-day Saints on the committee, led by Frank William Gay.^[52] In addition to supervising day-to-day business operations and Hughes' health, they also went to great pains to satisfy Hughes' every whim. Hughes once became fond of Baskin-Robbins' Banana Ripple ice cream, so his aides sought to secure a bulk shipment for him—only to discover that Baskin-Robbins had discontinued the flavor. They put in a request for the smallest amount the company could provide for a special order, 200 gallons (750 L), and had it shipped from Los Angeles. A few days after the order arrived, Hughes announced he was tired of Banana Ripple and wanted only Chocolate Marshmallow ice cream. The Desert Inn ended up distributing free Banana Ripple ice cream to casino customers for a year. In a 1996 interview, ex-Howard Hughes communicator Robert Maheu said "There is a rumor that there is still some Banana Ripple ice cream left in the freezer. It is most likely true."

As an owner of several major businesses in Las Vegas, Hughes wielded enormous political and economic influence in Nevada and elsewhere. During the 1960s and early 1970s, Hughes disapproved of the underground nuclear testing taking place at the Nevada Test Site. Hughes was concerned about the risk posed by the residual nuclear radiation from the tests, and so attempted to halt the tests. When the tests finally went through despite Hughes' efforts, the detonations were powerful enough that the entire hotel in which he was staying trembled with the shock waves.^[53] In two separate, last-ditch maneuvers, Hughes instructed his representatives to offer million-dollar bribes to both presidents Lyndon B. Johnson and Richard Nixon.^[54] His aides, however, never offered the bribes, instead reporting to Hughes that Johnson declined the offer and they were unable to contact Nixon.^{[citation needed]}

In 1971, Jean Peters filed for divorce; the two had not lived together for many years. Peters requested a lifetime alimony payment of US$70,000 a year, adjusted for inflation, and waived all claims to Hughes' estate. Hughes offered her a settlement of over a million dollars, but she declined it. Hughes did not insist upon a confidentiality agreement from Peters as a condition of the divorce; aides reported that Hughes never spoke ill of her. She refused to discuss her life with Hughes and declined several lucrative offers from publishers and biographers. Peters would state only that she had not seen Hughes for several years before their divorce and had only dealt with him by phone.

Hughes was living in the Intercontinental Hotel near Lake Managua in Nicaragua, seeking privacy and security,^[55] when a magnitude 6.5 earthquake damaged Managua in December 1972. As a precaution, Hughes moved to the Nicaraguan National Palace and stayed there as a guest of Anastasio Somoza Debayle before leaving for Florida on a private jet the following day.^[56] He subsequently moved into the Penthouse at the Xanadu Princess Resort on Grand Bahama Island, which he had recently purchased. He lived almost exclusively in the penthouse of the Xanadu Beach Resort & Marina for the last four years of his life. Hughes had spent a total of US$300 million on his many properties in Las Vegas.^[50]

Memoir hoax[link]

In 1972, author Clifford Irving created a media sensation when he claimed to have co-written an authorized autobiography of Hughes. Hughes was such a reclusive figure that he did not immediately publicly refute Irving's statement, leading many people to believe Irving's book was a genuine autobiography. Before the book's publication, however, Hughes finally denounced Irving in a teleconference and the entire project was eventually exposed as a hoax. Irving was later convicted of fraud and spent 17 months in prison. In 1974, the Orson Welles film F for Fake included a section dealing with the entire Hughes biography hoax. In 1977, The Hoax by Clifford Irving was published in England; it is the story of these events. The 2007 film The Hoax, starring Richard Gere, is based on these events.^[57]

Death[link]

Hughes was reported to have died on April 5, 1976, at 1:27 pm on board an aircraft owned by Robert Graf and piloted by Jeff Abrams, en route from his penthouse at the Acapulco Fairmont Princess Hotel in Mexico to The Methodist Hospital in Houston, Texas. Alternatively, other accounts indicate that he died in the flight from Freeport Grand Bahamas to Houston.^[58] His reclusive activities (and possibly his drug use) made him practically unrecognizable; his hair, beard, fingernails, and toenails were long (possibly due to allodynia making him averse to touch^[32]), his tall 6 ft 4 in (193 cm) frame now weighed barely 90 lb (41 kg), and the FBI had to resort to fingerprints to identify the body.^[59] Howard Hughes' alias, John T. Conover, was used upon the arrival of his body at a morgue in Houston on the day of his death. There, his body was received by Dr. Jack Titus.^[60]

A subsequent autopsy noted kidney failure as the cause of death. Hughes was in extremely poor physical condition at the time of his death. He suffered from malnutrition. While his kidneys were damaged, his other internal organs, including his brain, were deemed perfectly healthy.^[32] X-rays revealed five broken-off hypodermic needles in the flesh of his arms.^[32] To inject codeine into his muscles, Hughes used glass syringes with metal needles that easily became detached.^[32] Phenacetin, used for chronic pain, may have been the cause of his kidney failure.^[32]

Hughes is buried in the Glenwood Cemetery in Houston, Texas, next to his parents.^[61]

Estate[link]

Approximately three weeks after Hughes' death, a handwritten will was found on the desk of an official of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Salt Lake City. The so-called "Mormon Will" gave US$1.56 billion to various charitable organizations (including US$625 million to the Howard Hughes Medical Institute); nearly US$470 million to the upper management in Hughes' companies and to his aides; US$156 million to first cousin William Lummis; and US$156 million split equally between his two ex-wives Ella Rice and Jean Peters.

A further US$156 million was endowed to a gas-station owner named Melvin Dummar. Dummar told reporters that late one evening in December 1967, he found a disheveled and dirty man lying along U.S. Highway 95, 150 miles (240 km) north of Las Vegas. The man asked for a ride to Las Vegas. Dropping him off at the Sands Hotel, Dummar said the man told him he was Hughes. Dummar then claimed that days after Hughes's death, a "mysterious man" appeared at his gas station, leaving an envelope containing the will on his desk. Unsure if the will was genuine, and unsure of what to do, Dummar left the will at the LDS Church office. In a trial lasting seven months, the Mormon Will was eventually rejected by the Nevada court in June 1978 as a forgery. The court declared that Hughes had died intestate.

Hughes' US$2.5 billion estate was eventually split in 1983 among 22 cousins, including William Lummis who serves as a trustee of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Dummar was largely discounted by the public as a phony and an opportunist. Jonathan Demme's film Melvin and Howard (starring Jason Robards and Paul Le Mat), was based on Dummar's tale.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Hughes Aircraft was owned by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, which sold it to General Motors in 1985 for US$5.2 billion. Suits brought by the states of California and Texas claiming they were owed inheritance tax were both rejected by the court. In 1984, Hughes's estate paid an undisclosed amount to Terry Moore, who claimed to have been secretly married to Hughes on a yacht in international waters off Mexico in 1949 and never divorced. Although Moore never produced proof of a marriage, her book, The Beauty and the Billionaire, became a bestseller.

Awards[link]

This section requires expansion.

• Congressional Gold Medal (presented August 7, 1939).

Popular culture[link]

Howard Hughes has now emerged as one of the 20th century's most iconic business and aviation figures spawning a wide range of cultural references.

Audio[link]

• Howard Hughes flying boat maiden test run and flight, Parts 1 & 2. [soundrecording] (1947). LCCN 20-646215, LCCN 20-646218
• The American rock band Kansas recorded a song entitled, "Closet Chronicles", on their 1977 album, "Point of Know Return". This song, written by Steve Walsh and Kerry Livgren, is an allegory about Howard Hughes.^{[citation needed]}
• The British comedy musical duo Pig With The Face Of A Boy recorded a song named "Howard Hughes Blues" for their debut album, "La La Haha". The song contains humorous lyrics concerning Howard Hughes' eccentricities.^{[citation needed]}

Film[link]

(Chronological)

• Willard Whyte, a billionaire from the 1971 James Bond movie, Diamonds Are Forever, is based on Howard Hughes. Hughes, a friend of producer Albert Broccoli, allowed his hotel and casino to be used in the filming.
• The Amazing Howard Hughes (1977), directed by William A. Graham. Tommy Lee Jones stars as Howard Hughes.
• Melvin and Howard (1980), directed by Jonathan Demme and starring Jason Robards (a distant cousin) as Howard Hughes and Paul Le Mat as Melvin Dummar. The film won Academy Awards for Best Original Screenplay and Best Supporting Actress (Mary Steenburgen). The film focuses on Melvin Dummar's claims of meeting Hughes in the Nevada desert and subsequent estate battles over his inclusion in Hughes's will. Critic Pauline Kael called the film "an almost flawless act of sympathetic imagination."^[62]
• Hughes was portrayed by Terry O'Quinn in Disney's The Rocketeer (1991), substituting for the "mystery inventor" (Doc Savage) in the original comic book version.
• "Howard Hughes Documentary", broadcast in 1992 as an episode of the Time Machine documentary series, was introduced by Peter Graves, later released by A&E Home Video.^[63]
• Before The Aviator (2004), there were several attempts to create a biopic based on the life of Hughes. For years, director-actor Warren Beatty wanted to play Hughes and direct a big-screen film of the mogul. It was to be released alongside Beatty's film Reds, but due to the lack of the right script, the project was abandoned. In the 1990s, producers with Touchstone Pictures wanted to do it with John Malkovich, Edward Norton, or Johnny Depp as Hughes, but, due to climbing costs, that venture was abandoned. Castle Rock Entertainment also tried to develop a biopic called Mr. Hughes with Jim Carrey starring and with Christopher Nolan directing and re-writing a script originated by David Koepp and Brian De Palma. When The Aviator began production, the idea was scrapped, and Nolan went on to direct Batman Begins. Some of the details of Hughes as an adult were confirmed in A. Scott Berg's memoir of Katharine Hepburn, Kate Remembered.
• The Aviator (2004), directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Leonardo DiCaprio as Hughes. Nominated for 11 Academy Awards, and winning five, the acclaimed film focuses primarily on Hughes' achievements in aviation and in the movies and on the increasing handicaps imposed on him by his obsessive–compulsive behavior, and ends shortly after the successful flight of the Hercules in 1947.
• Iron Man, directed by Jon Favreau is an adaptation of a comic book about a wealthy weapons manufacturer, Tony Stark. According to creator Stan Lee, the character's personality and playboy lifestyle were inspired by Hughes,^[64] explaining, "Howard Hughes was one of the most colorful men of our time. He was an inventor, an adventurer, a multi-billionaire, a ladies' man and finally a nutcase".^[65]
• Howard Hughes: The Real Aviator documentary was broadcast in 2004, and went on to win the Grand Festival Award for Best Documentary at the 2004 Berkeley Video & Film Festival.^[66]
• The American Aviator: The Howard Hughes Story was broadcast in 2006 on the Biography Channel. It was later released to home media as a DVD with a copy of the full length film The Outlaw starring Jane Russell.^[67]

Games[link]

• In BioShock, Andrew Ryan, founder of the dystopian underwater city, Rapture, was based between Howard Hughes and Ayn Rand.^{[citation needed]}
• In Fallout: New Vegas, one of the major characters, Mr. House is based upon Hughes' personality and achievements as a prodigal engineer.^{[citation needed]}
• In L.A. Noire, Hughes makes an appearance presenting his Hercules H-4 aircraft in the opening introduction of the game.^[68]

References[link]

Notes[link]

Citations[link]

Bibliography[link]

Additional resources[link]

• Photograph collections related to Hughes: Houston Public Library; University of Nevada, Las Vegas; Evergreen Aviation and Space Museum; Charles Barton, Inc.

External links[link]

	Houston portal
	Biography portal

Listen to this article (info/dl)

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More spoken articles

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Howard Hughes

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Howard Hughes

• Howard Hughes at the Internet Movie Database
• AZORIAN The Raising of the K-129 / 2009 – 2 Part TV Documentary / Michael White Films Vienna
• Welcome Home Howard: Collection of photographs kept by UNLV
• Howard Hughes' Sikorsky at Brazoria County Airport, Texas (See Archives, July, 2009)
• Hughes legacy lives on in litigation – Houston Business Journal
• 1924 passport photo ; Howard Hughes
• "Plane Spans U.S. at Four Miles Per Minute" Popular Mechanics, April 1936 main photo of aircraft used in first coast to coast record breaking flight, small photo if of the original H-1.

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (July 2008)

Ava Gardner
a 1953 publicity photo
Born	Ava Lavinia Gardner (1922-12-24)December 24, 1922 Grabtown, North Carolina, U.S.
Died	January 25, 1990(1990-01-25) (aged 67) Westminster, London, England, UK
Occupation	Actress
Years active	1941–86
Spouse	Mickey Rooney (m. 1942–1943) «start: (1942)–end+1: (1944)»"Marriage: Mickey Rooney to Ava Gardner" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Ava_Gardner) Artie Shaw (m. 1945–1946) «start: (1945)–end+1: (1947)»"Marriage: Artie Shaw to Ava Gardner" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Ava_Gardner) Frank Sinatra (m. 1951–1957) «start: (1951)–end+1: (1958)»"Marriage: Frank Sinatra to Ava Gardner" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Ava_Gardner)

Ava Lavinia Gardner (December 24, 1922 – January 25, 1990) was an American actress.

She was signed to a contract by MGM Studios in 1941 and appeared mainly in small roles until she drew attention with her performance in The Killers (1946). She became one of Hollywood's leading actresses, considered one of the most beautiful women of her day. She was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her work in Mogambo (1953).

She appeared in several high-profile films from the 1950s to 1970s, including The Hucksters (1947), Show Boat (1951), The Snows of Kilimanjaro (1952), The Barefoot Contessa (1954), Bhowani Junction (1956), On the Beach (1959), Seven Days in May (1964), The Night of the Iguana (1964), The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (1972), Earthquake (1974), and The Cassandra Crossing (1976). Gardner continued to act regularly until 1986, four years before her death from pneumonia, at age 67, in 1990.

She is listed 25th among the American Film Institute's Greatest female stars.^[1]

Early years[link]

Gardner was born in the big farming community of Grabtown, Johnston County, North Carolina, the youngest of seven children (she had two brothers, Raymond and Melvin, and four sisters, Beatrice, Elsie Mae, Inez, and Myra). Her parents, Mary Elizabeth "Mollie" (née Baker) and Jonas Bailey Gardner, were poor cotton and tobacco farmers. Her ancestry was said to include Scots-Irish, English, Irish, French Huguenot, and American Indian (Tuscarora).^[2][3][4] She was raised a Baptist. While the children still were young, the Gardners lost their property, forcing Jonas Gardner to work at a sawmill and Mollie to begin working as a cook and housekeeper at a dormitory for teachers at the nearby Brogden School.

When Gardner was seven years old, the family decided to try their luck in a larger city, Newport News, Virginia, where Mollie Gardner found work managing a boardinghouse for the city's many shipworkers. While in Newport News, Gardner's father became ill and died from bronchitis in 1938, when Ava was 15 years old. After Jonas Gardner's death, the family moved to Rock Ridge near Wilson, North Carolina, where Mollie Gardner ran another boarding house for teachers. Ava Gardner attended high school in Rock Ridge and she graduated from there in 1939. She then attended secretarial classes at Atlantic Christian College in Wilson for about a year.

Early career[link]

in My Forbidden Past (1951)

Gardner was visiting her sister Beatrice ("Bappie") in New York in 1941 when Beatrice's husband Larry Tarr, a professional photographer, offered to take her portrait. He was so pleased with the results that he displayed the finished product in the front window of his Tarr Photography Studio on 25th Avenue.^{[citation needed]} A Loews Theatres legal clerk, Barnard "Barney" Duhan, spotted Gardner's photo in Tarr's studio. At the time, Duhan often posed as an MGM talent scout to meet girls, using the fact that MGM was a subsidiary of Loews. Duhan entered Tarr's and tried to get Gardner's number, but was rebuffed by the receptionist. Duhan made the offhand comment, "Somebody should send her info to MGM", and the Tarrs did so immediately. Shortly after, Gardner, who at the time was a student at Atlantic Christian College, traveled to New York to be interviewed at MGM's New York office by Al Altman, head of MGM's New York talent department. With cameras rolling, he directed the eighteen-year-old to walk toward the camera, turn and walk away, then rearrange some flowers in a vase. He did not attempt to record her voice because her Southern accent made it almost impossible for him to understand her. Though Al thought Ava the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen, he believed the test was a disaster and was completely surprised by what he saw in the screening room. On screen she was magnetic. The camera loved her. He sent the test to Hollywood. Louis B. Mayer, head of the studio, sent a telegram to Al: "She can't sing, she can't act, she can't talk, She's terrific!" She was offered a standard contract by MGM, and left school for Hollywood in 1941 with her sister Bappie accompanying her. MGM's first order of business was to provide her a speech coach, as her Carolina drawl was nearly incomprehensible to them.^[5]

Career[link]

Gardner came to prominence in the Mark Hellinger-produced smash hit film noir The Killers (1946), which introduced Burt Lancaster to the screen in the lead role.

With Burt Lancaster in The Killers (1946)

The Killers (1946)

Other films include The Hucksters (1947) with Clark Gable, Show Boat (1951), The Snows of Kilimanjaro (1952) with Gregory Peck, Lone Star (1952) with Clark Gable, Mogambo (1953) with Clark Gable and Grace Kelly, 1954's The Barefoot Contessa with Humphrey Bogart (which some consider to be Gardner's "signature film" since it mirrored her real life custom of going barefoot), Bhowani Junction (1956), The Sun Also Rises with Tyrone Power and Errol Flynn (in which she played party-girl Brett Ashley) (1957), and the film version of Nevil Shute's best-selling On the Beach with Peck and Fred Astaire. Off-camera, she could be witty and pithy, as in her assessment of director John Ford, who directed Mogambo ("The meanest man on earth. Thoroughly evil. Adored him!")^[6]

As torch singer-on-the-make Jean Ogilvie in 1947's The Hucksters, doing some selling of her own to radio ad-man Clark Gable

Gardner again appeared with Lancaster, this time paired with Kirk Douglas, in Seven Days in May (1962), a taut thriller about a military takeover of the US government. She found herself billed between Charlton Heston and David Niven in the epic 55 Days at Peking in 1963, a lavish version of the Chinese revolt against foreign control during the Boxer Rebellion in 1900.

The following year, she played her last great leading role in a superlative film, The Night of the Iguana (1964), based upon a Tennessee Williams play and starring Richard Burton as an atheist clergyman and Deborah Kerr as a gentle artist traveling with her aged poet grandfather. John Huston directed the movie in Puerto Vallarta Mexico, insisting on making the film in black and white, a decision he later regretted because of the vivid colors of the flora. Gardner received billing below Burton but above Deborah Kerr. Gardner was nominated for a BAFTA and a Golden Globe award for her hearty performance in this signature role.

Two years later, in 1966, Gardner briefly sought the role of Mrs. Robinson in Mike Nichols' The Graduate (1967). She reportedly called Nichols and said, "I want to see you! I want to talk about this Graduate thing!" Nichols never seriously considered her for the part, preferring to cast a younger woman (Anne Bancroft was 36 while Gardner was 45), but he did visit her hotel, where he later recounted that "she sat at a little French desk with a telephone, she went through every movie star cliché. She said, 'All right, let's talk about your movie. First of all, I strip for nobody.'"^[7]

Gardner moved to London, England in 1968, undergoing an elective hysterectomy to allay her worries of contracting the uterine cancer that had claimed the life of her own mother. That year, she made what some consider to be one of her best films, Mayerling, in which she played the supporting role of Austrian Empress Elisabeth of Austria opposite James Mason as Emperor Franz Joseph I.

Mogambo (1953)

She appeared in a number of disaster films throughout the 1970s, notably Earthquake (1974) with Charlton Heston, The Cassandra Crossing (1976), and the Canadian movie City on Fire (1979). She also appeared briefly as Lillie Langtry at the end of The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (1972) with Paul Newman and Jacqueline Bisset, and in The Blue Bird (1976) with Elizabeth Taylor and Jane Fonda.

Her last movie was Regina Roma (1982), a direct-to-video release. In the 1980s she acted primarily on television, including the miniseries remake of The Long Hot Summer (1985) and the prime-time soap opera Knots Landing, also in 1985. In 1986 she appeared in her two final projects, the TV movies Harem and Maggie.

Marriages and relationships[link]

Mickey Rooney[link]

Soon after her arrival in Los Angeles, Gardner met fellow MGM contract player Mickey Rooney; they married on January 10, 1942, in Ballard, California; she was 19 years old and he was 21. They divorced in 1943. He reputedly rhapsodized about their sex life later, but Gardner said, "He may have enjoyed the sex, but [goodness knows] I didn't."^{[citation needed]} She once characterized their marriage as "Love Finds Andy Hardy".

Howard Hughes[link]

Gardner became a friend of businessman and aviator Howard Hughes in the early to mid-1940s and the relationship lasted into the 1950s.^[8] Ava stated in her autobiography Ava: My Story, that she was never in love with Howard Hughes, but he was in and out of her life for about twenty years. Howard's trust in Ava was what kept their relationship alive. She describes him as "painfully shy, completely enigmatic and more eccentric...than anyone [she] had ever met." ^[9]

Artie Shaw[link]

Gardner's second marriage was brief and to jazz musician and band leader Artie Shaw, from 1945 to 1946.

Frank Sinatra[link]

Sinatra, whose career had seriously slumped, accompanied his wife Gardner to Africa during filming for Mogambo (1953)

Gardner's third and last marriage (1951–1957) was to singer and actor Frank Sinatra. She would later say in her autobiography that he was the love of her life. Sinatra left his wife, Nancy, for Ava and their subsequent marriage made headlines. Sinatra was savaged by gossip columnists Hedda Hopper and Louella Parsons, the Hollywood establishment, the Roman Catholic Church and by his fans for leaving his wife for a noted femme fatale. Gardner used her considerable influence, particularly with Harry Cohn's wife, to get Sinatra cast in his Oscar-winning role in From Here to Eternity (1953). That role and the award revitalized both Sinatra's acting and singing careers.

The Gardner-Sinatra marriage was tumultuous. Gardner confided to Artie Shaw, her second husband, that “With him [Frank] it’s impossible…it’s like being with a woman. He’s so gentle. It’s as though he thinks I’ll break, as though I’m a piece of Dresden china and he’s gonna hurt me.” ^[10] During their marriage Gardner became pregnant twice, but she had two abortions. "MGM had all sorts of penalty clauses about their stars having babies," she said.^[11] She said years later, "We couldn't even take care of ourselves. How were we going to take care of a baby?"^{[citation needed]} Gardner and Sinatra remained good friends for the rest of her life.

Luis Miguel Dominguín[link]

Gardner divorced Sinatra in 1957 and headed to Spain where she began a friendship with writer Ernest Hemingway. While staying with Hemingway at his villa in San Francisco de Paula in Havana, Cuba, Gardner once swam alone with no bathing suit in his pool. After watching her, Hemingway ordered his staff: "The water is not to be emptied".^[12] Gardner's friendship with Hemingway led to her becoming a fan of bullfighting and bullfighters such as Luis Miguel Dominguín, who became her lover. "It was a sort of madness, honey," she said later of the time.^{[citation needed]}

Final years and death[link]

After a lifetime of smoking, Gardner suffered from emphysema, a terminal disease, in addition to an auto-immune disorder (which may have been lupus).^{[citation needed]} Two strokes in 1986 left her partially paralyzed and bedridden. Although Gardner could afford her medical expenses, Sinatra wanted to pay for her to visit a specialist in the United States, and she allowed him to make the arrangements for a medically-staffed private plane. Her last words (to her housekeeper Carmen), were reportedly, "I'm so tired," before she died of pneumonia at the age of 67. After her death, Sinatra's daughter, Tina, found him slumped in his room, crying, and unable to speak.^[13]

Gardner was not only the love of his life, but also was the inspiration for one of his most personal songs, "I'm a Fool to Want You", which Sinatra (who received a co-writing credit for the song) recorded twice, toward the end of his contract with Columbia Records and during his years on Capitol Records. ("It was Ava who taught him how to sing a torch song",^{[citation needed]} Sinatra arranger Nelson Riddle was once quoted as saying.) Because of the presence of a black limousine parked behind the crowd of 500 mourners, it was reported that Sinatra attended her funeral; it turned out to be a hairstylist from Fayetteville, North Carolina, who felt that a limousine was the only appropriate mode of transportation to Gardner's funeral. A floral arrangement at Gardner's graveside simply read: "With My Love, Francis".^{[citation needed]}

Gardner was buried in the Sunset Memorial Park, Smithfield, North Carolina, next to her brothers and their parents, Jonah (1878–1938) and Mollie Gardner (1883–1943). The town of Smithfield now has an Ava Gardner Museum.

Award Nominations[link]

Gardner was nominated for an Academy Award for Mogambo (1953); the award was won by Audrey Hepburn for Roman Holiday. Her performance as Maxine Faulk in The Night of the Iguana (1964), was well reviewed, and she was nominated a BAFTA Award and a Golden Globe.

Film portrayals[link]

Gardner has been portrayed by Marcia Gay Harden in the TV miniseries Sinatra, Deborah Kara Unger in HBO's The Rat Pack, Kate Beckinsale in the 2004 Howard Hughes biopic, The Aviator and Anna Drijver in the 2012 Italian TV film Walter Chiari - Fino all'ultima risata.^[14]

Filmography[link]