Howard Robard Hughes, Sr. was born in Lancaster, Missouri on 9 September 1869 to Felix Turner Hughes and Jean Amelia Summerlin Hughes. He was an entrepreneur, but he is best known as the father of Howard Robard Hughes, Jr. Hughes Sr. was the quintessential entrepreneur, trying many ideas and failing before he found his niche as an inventor of a bit that discovered virtually all the oil discovered during the initial years of rotary drilling. This invention was how Howard Junior became the wealthiest person in the world.
Hughes Sr. attended Morgan Park Military Academy in Chicago and the Missouri Military Academy in Mexico, Missouri. He entered Harvard University in 1893, but after two years he left to study law at the University of Iowa. Then, without completing his law course, he began to practice law with his father in Keokuk, Iowa. He then ended up in Dallas, Texas, by 1904, where he married Allene Stone Gao. After their honeymoon tour of England, France and Germany, they returned to Houston, Texas with very little money.
In Texas, however, Hughes became involved wih the Spindletop oil discovery, and he began to create basic patents for the Sharp-Hughes Rock Bit. He also patented a two-cone rotary drill bit that pentrated medium and hard rock with ten times the speed of any former bit, and its discover basically revolutionized oil well drilling.
Hughes co-founded the Sharp-Hughes Tool Company with Watler Sharp and after Sharp's death in 1912, Hughes took over management. He eventually acquired full ownership of the company and renamed it to Hughes Tool Company. After Hughes Sr.'s death in 1924, his only child Howard R. Hughes, Jr. assumed control of the company as its sole owner. During 1972 Huges Jr. made the tool company public and realized $150 million the day it sold.
Hughes Sr. died in 1924, leaving a majority of his wealth to his only child.
Image: Howard R. Hughes Sr. and wife Allene Passport Application photo, 1920. |