8. The Tycoon Who Abused His Business to Indulge in Personal Pettiness
Few people would be surprised to learn that Howard Hughes (1905 – 1976), the billionaire recluse, eccentric, and all-around weirdo, could be a jackass at times. When Hughes was still a child, his father invented a rotary bit to drill oil wells in previously inaccessible places and made the already financially comfortable family fabulously wealthy. Hughes thus grew up in the lap of luxury, and all doors were opened for him to maximize his – admittedly great – potential. He became a successful pilot, engineer, movie director, investor, and business tycoon.
People that successful often have a bit of jackass in them, and are reluctant to accept “no” as an answer from anybody. However, Hughes went to extremes of pettiness in order to unleash his inner jerk. For example, he once bought a major movie studio to which an ex-girlfriend was contracted, just so he could mess with and wreck her career. As seen below, his victim was Jane Greer (1924 – 2001), a film noir actress who made a splash in the 1940s with femme fatale roles in movies such as Out of the Past, Dick Tracy, and The Big Steal.
