Finished (Audiobook) - "Howard Hughes, Empire" - Donald L. Bartlett and James L. Steele

I remember some of the Howard Hughes mystery and remember reading the odd book about him when I was a teen.

"Howard Hughes, Empire" was a good book to listen to.  The book put Hughes into perspective - he was a control freak, even when his mental illness was less apparent, as shown by his obsessive tendencies in aircraft design and need for control of even small, irrelevant aspects of events (for example, he had explicit instructions regarding picking up and driving around VIPs, including how to get out of the car, how to cross the gutter and enter the building).
What surprised me was how poor a business man Hughes was.  He inherited a thriving business (the Hughes Tool Company) which made its fortune on a oil-drilling bit patented by Hughes Sr. at an ideal point in history with the oil discoveries in the U.S..  The bit was not originally designed by Hughes Sr., but he was smart enough to buy and patent the rights, and apparently he did make some modifications and improvements over time.

Howard Jr. (the famous Hughes) never really made any money.  He bought RKO studios (a big player at the time) and basically ran it into the ground.  Similar pattern with TWA.  His reputation was immense, and he had the image of a real player and money maker, but there is little evidence that he was able to make any headway in supporting that reputation.  The Tool Company ran without his involvement and stayed profitable - Hughes himself was actually a problem with expansion and other decisions - he really didn't want to do much of the actual company management.

Even his exploits as a pilot - no doubt he was a pilot and probably a decent one.  However, he was in several crashes, which doesn't support the "excellent pilot" image he sported - it does support the "daredevil", however.

The stories of late in life, being basically a prisoner of his mental illness, moving occasionally between hotel rooms (all sealed off, windows blacked out) in different countries, basically sitting naked, on drugs, watching movies.  

Basically a very sad end for someone who certainly could afford proper mental healthcare.  The take-home messages are that mental health can impact everyone, and maybe a caution to the wealthy that money is not always a good thing - a middle-class Hughes probably couldn't hide his illness and probably would have been exposed to proper medical care much earlier in life.  His money basically allowed him to buy drugs (codeine addiction) and self-medicate without any objections - his outcome probably would have been much more positive had he not been the "richest man in the world".