Howard Hughes

Howard Robard Hughes, Jr. was an American aviator, industrialist, film producer/director, philanthropist, and one of the wealthiest people in the world. He gained fame in the late 1920s as a maverick film producer, making big-budget and often-controversial films like Hell's Angels, Scarface, and The Outlaw. As an aviator, Hughes set multiple world air-speed records, built the Hughes H-1 Racer and H-4 "Spruce Goose" aircraft, and acquired and expanded Trans World Airlines. Despite his contributions to aeronautics and his other professional achievements, Hughes is perhaps most widely remembered for his highly-publicized descent into madness in later life. Nonetheless, Hughes' legacy is still visible through the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, and he remains one of the most influential aviators in American history.