6. Howard Hughes made a fortune through the movies and aviation but left a legacy in medicine and healthcare
These days, Howard Hughes is often best remembered for his eccentric behavior, and above all for the OCD that dominated his later years. However, thanks to the work of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute in particular, his generosity also endures. In his day, Hughes was one of the richest men on the planet. He was also one of the most generous, too, giving away vast sums of money through a range of philanthropic initiatives.
After making a name for himself as a producer in 1920s’ Hollywood, Hughes moved into aviation. Throughout the 1930s and 40s, he spent vast amounts of cash on setting a series of world air speed records. And he was a huge success, too. Even today, Hughes is regarded as a key aviation pioneer and adventurer. But he wasn’t simply reckless. He also looked to the future, which is why he established his Medical Institute in 1953.
In fact, he’d been planning on earning a fortune and then giving it away for some time. When he was 19, he wrote a will and testament declaring that a medical institute be established bearing his name. Years later, he decided to establish such a center in his own lifetime, a decision partly-influenced by the fact that the IRS was pursuing him for a significant sum of money. The new institute was gifted all the stock its founder held in the Hughes Aircraft Company, effectively making the aerospace firm a non-profit entity.
When Hughes died in 1976, he passed without leaving a will. As a result, his fortune was divided up among his relatives rather than going to the Medical Institute. However, the center’s board sold its shares in Hughes Aircraft to General Motors in 1985 for a massive $5.2 billion. Today, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute has an endowment of more than $15 billion, making it one of the largest private organizations devoted to medical research in the world.