"The Loneliest Man On Earth."

CCLXIII

Howard Hughes’ grandfather, Felix Hughes, was a Missouri judge. He sent his son Howard (Howard Hughes’ father) to Harvard to get a law degree, but Howard the elder dropped out (eventually he got his LL.B. from Iowa State, and worked for a while in a patent firm). But Howard Senior was a man with a restless mind, and he traveled down to Texas to become an oil wildcatter. Harvard educated, he was an odd duck among the rough-hewn men of the oil fields. As he had been in the law he was only a moderate success in the oil business, but when he invented and, more importantly knew to patent the Hughes drill bit, he became a millionaire.

Howard Robards Hughes Sr.

He was indulgent of his only son, making sure he had books to read, puzzles to finish, and all kinds of kits and things to build --- and just as importantly, unbuild --- because Howard Jr., whom his parents called “Sonny,” was fascinated by how things worked. As a little boy he would disassemble and reassemble complex items like watches, learning by osmosis how they did what they did. At age nine he turned a doorbell into a crude transmitter, a presage to his assembly of a ham radio station at age eleven.  Unlike most Edwardian-era fathers, the elder Howard was warm and affectionate toward his only child. Sonny stood in awe of his father, and even after he’d become a billionaire and one of the most famous men on Earth, he never felt equal to Howard Senior. 

Sonny and his steam-powered bicycle. Later, such contraptions were marketed as “velocipedes”

Since Howard Senior worked indefatigably to provide for the family, and since the Hughes drill bit had become the industry standard essentially wherever oil was mined, he was often away from home. Sonny was left in the care of his mother Allene, who fussed and fretted over him constantly. Allene Hughes has been described by biographers flatly as “a little weird”; How weird depends on one’s perspective.

Howard Hughes and his mother Allene

Virtually all of her attention was focused on Howard, and constantly. With servants to do the drudge work of cleaning and cooking, she had little else to do but dote on her only child. She feared that Howard might get sick or be injured somehow, and she watched over him with the fierce protective instincts only a mother can summon. 

Early in his life Howard Hughes learned that playing sick was a surefire way to guarantee that Allene redoubled her attentions on him. He also discovered, quite to his delight, that he could even summon his father from the farthest, most distant reaches of the world if he convinced his mother he was sick enough. Not only did he gain the attention of both parents that way, but he drew them together in mutual concern, his “illnesses” acting to counterbalance their evident estrangement. Playing sick was effective. Being sick was even more effective. Howard began developing hypochondriasis, a condition that would plague him all his life.  And his illnesses (faked, imagined, and occasionally real) reinforced Allene’s horror of uncleanness and germs. As an adult, Howard would lose himself in this fixation. 

Sonny, dressed to the nines

It is important to remember that Howard was born in 1905, before the advent of antibiotics, penicillin, and most prophylactic vaccinations. Death in childhood was not uncommon, and from disorders we consider minor today, like bronchitis and chicken pox. Diseases like typhoid, diphtheria, and scarlet fever ran rampant. Even a bad cut could get severely infected, leading to a possible amputation or even death. When Howard was a little older, the Spanish Flu pandemic carried off a full 1% of the human race. 

Add these very real fears to the fact that Allene had no other offspring, and leaven them with social isolation (an absent husband) and a propensity toward anxiety (which was readily apparent), and the result is a volatile compound, a compound which Allene ate, slept, and drank, and fed to her son for years. She bathed with him until he was at least ten, and whenever his father was absent she made sure Howard slept in her bed, where he’d fall asleep in his mother’s arms. Given his later obsession with the female breast, it’s theorized that she allowed him to suckle well into childhood.

Epidemiologist Robert Koch with a Zeiss microscope, circa 1900

Howard was rarely allowed off their fenced-in property, not even to play a pickup game of baseball, and he made no real childhood friends. Even the few boys allowed over now and again very rarely passed muster with Allene, and were usually not invited back. He was a lonely boy, though perhaps he didn’t always consciously realize it. 

One summer, his father insisted he go to sleep-away camp and brooked no opposition. Sonny went, but Allene rented digs adjacent to the camp so that she could be near her son, who took most of his meals with her. He rarely bunked with his campmates, preferring to stay with Allene most overnights. 

On the positive side, Allene provided him with everything he needed or asked for. When he accomplished anything well (and he seemed to accomplish everything he did well) her praise was fulsome. He was the most talented, the sweetest, the best boy she could ever ask for, and the constant praise certainly helped him develop a powerful personality and an outsized ego. When he converted his bicycle into a steam motorcycle she even called the local paper, which sent a photographer and a reporter to cover the story. 

Early on, Howard Hughes learned that positive accomplishments brought positive attention --- and just as importantly, not only from Allene, but from the world at large. 

It was not until he was fourteen that his mother’s chokehold on his life began to loosen. Allene thought flying was dangerous, but despite her objections he started taking flying lessons (looked at in light of her anxieties his frequent crashes take on an interesting cast). After he soloed, his father encouraged his pursuit of aviation by buying him a ride in a flying boat as a congratulatory gift. 

The Fessenden School today

At fourteen, he was enrolled at the prestigious Fessenden School in West Newton, Massachusetts. He went happily enough. He was shy with other boys, and self-isolated, preferring golf and horseback riding to carousing with the fellows. His mother wrote to the Headmaster, “I think it is awfully hard for an only child to adjust himself well in school and make friends as he should, and I am very interested to hear from you about him.” 

His grades at Fessenden were good; his math and science grades were exemplary, and he developed a reputation among the other boys as a bookworm. No one seemed inclined to torment him, though, even as the new boy.   

The next year he transferred to the Thacher School in Ojai, California, where his father had a branch office. He was sixteen and on his way to being groomed to take over the family business.

Then Allene died suddenly.

Ambassador Hotel dining room, 1920s

She was only thirty-eight. Having suffered an ectopic pregnancy she had checked into the hospital in Houston for the necessary surgery, and never woke up from the anesthetic. Howard was devastated (later in life, the idea of pregnancy terrified him, and he frequently pressured lovers to terminate unexpected pregnancies). Howard Senior was equally devastated. He travelled to California to comfort his inconsolable son, but he was inconsolable himself. They lived at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles for the next year and a half, bonding, giving each other mutual support, and grieving together. Sonny managed to finish at Thach, and returned to Texas to attend Rice University, but being distant from his father caused him pain. Deeply depressed, he returned to Los Angeles. He attended Caltech but was too disinterested to pay attention, and dropped out.

The two Howards discussed a fresh start. Howard Senior’s younger brother Rupert, a very well-known Hollywood screenwriter promised them an entrée into the film industry. They decided to create their own production company.

An early photo of the Hughes Tool Company in its first building and featuring the name of Howard Sr.’s partner

To free up capital for the new venture, Howard Senior decided to sell the Hughes Tool Company, and travelled back to Texas to arrange the sale. He had barely arrived when he suffered a sudden, fatal heart attack and died at his desk in the Humble Oil building, literally of a broken heart. 

Sonny (who would never be called Sonny again) was orphaned at sixteen. Still mourning his mother, the loss of his father thoroughly isolated him. There were uncles and aunts and cousins, and for a few months he bounced between them, too young to be on his own but too old to be parented by anyone. He appreciated their kindnesses, but there was no one left who loved him.  

At age 18, he petitioned the Court and was granted his legal majority three years early. The judge was impressed with the well-dressed, serious, articulate young man, and congratulated him on the accomplishment. It must have tasted like gall in his mouth. The feeling of being bereft would define Howard Hughes for the rest of his life. 

He may have been the richest man in the world at one point, but he was always, as one of his lawyers admitted, “The loneliest man on earth.”

“Passion will make you crazy, but is there any other way to live?” --- Howard Hughes