Hughes was a lifelong aircraft enthusiast, pilot, and self-taught aircraft engineer. He set many world records and designed and built several aircraft himself while heading Hughes Aircraft. The most technologically important aircraft he designed was the Hughes H-1 Racer. On 13 September 1935, Hughes, flying the H-1, set the airspeed record of 352 mph over his test course near Santa Ana, California. The previous record was 314 mph). A year and a half later, (19 January 1937), flying a somewhat re-designed H-1 Racer, Hughes set a new transcontinental airspeed record by flying non-stop from Los Angeles to New York City in 7 hours, 28 minutes and 25 seconds (beating his own previous record of 9 hours, 27 minutes).
On 10 July 1938 Hughes set another record by completing a flight around the world in just 91 hours (3 days, 19 hours), beating the previous record by more than four days. For this flight he did not fly a plane of his own design but a Lockheed Super Electra (a twin-engine plane with a four-man crew) fitted with all of the latest radio and navigational equipment. Hughes wanted the flight to be a triumph of technology, illustrating that safe, long-distance air travel was possible. In 1938, the William P. Hobby Airport in Houston, Texas, known at the time as Houston Municipal Airport, was re-named “Howard Hughes Airport,” but the name was changed back after people objected to naming the airport after a living person.
Hughes received many awards as an aviator, including the Harmon Trophy in 1936 and 1938, the Collier Trophy in 1938, the Octave Chanute Award in 1940, and a special Congressional Gold Medal in 1939 “in recognition of the achievements of Howard Hughes in advancing the science of aviation and thus bringing great credit to his country throughout the world.” According to his obituary in the New York Times, Hughes never bothered to come to Washington to pick up the Congressional Gold Medal. It was eventually mailed to him by President Harry S. Truman.
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