12. Howard Hughes was a billionaire playboy and aviator in his youth but his later life was dominated by his obsessive phobia and fear of germs
Howard Hughes was a true pioneer. He was a key figure in the birth of the aviation industry, being a brave and brilliant pilot himself. He is also a successful movie producer and billionaire businessman. But despite all his achievements, Hughes is probably best remembered for his eccentric ways and, above all, for his phobias. The last years of his life in particular were consumed by his crippling phobia of germs, a fear that led him to become a near-complete recluse for some 20 years.
After his death in 1976, doctors carried out an examination of Hughes’s brain, trying to figure out what exactly plagued. They also looked into his life and came to the conclusion that the eccentric behavior that dominated his later years had its roots in childhood. Hughes was a mollycoddled young boy. His mother, irrationally fearful he would contract polio, kept him isolated from other children and was obsessive about germs and hygiene, overreacting to the slightest cough or sniffle. Evidently, this rubbed off on the young Howard.
As an adult, Hughes became increasingly paranoid about germs. He required his servants to take extreme precautions, and there were even whole manuals for them to consult before they could prepare the billionaire’s lunch or clean his personal quarters. In today’s terms, he suffered from crippling Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD). Things got so bad that he would stay alone and isolated for weeks, even months, at a time, walking around with Kleenex boxes on his feet in place of shoes. But, ironically, Hughes neglected his own health and hygiene in later years. Firmly believing that he would stay clean if only he could keep outside germs away, he didn’t wash or even brush his teeth for months. He died of kidney failure at the age of 70, with his phobias and obsessions having led to a dangerous codeine addiction that most probably contributed to his eventual passing.