![\"Photo:](\"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/photo-0119-2017-howard-hughes.png\")
<\/a>He was a dashing and daring aviator in his 30s, designing and building his own aircraft and setting many air speed records. On 19 January 1937, he set one of those records: the transcontinental speed record, flying across the country in 7.5 hours at an average speed of 332 miles per hour.<\/p>\n Here is a transcription of this article:<\/p>\n Hughes Sets New Air Mark across Nation<\/p>\n Flyer Spans Continent from Los Angeles to Newark in 7 Hrs., 31 Min.<\/p>\n NEWARK, N.J., Tuesday, Jan. 19. \u2013 (AP) \u2013 Burning the wind at an estimated average speed of 332 miles an hour, Howard Hughes, the former movie producer, today drove his high-speed monoplane across the continent in 7 hours and 31 minutes for a new transcontinental speed mark.<\/p>\n The officials who checked Hughes in on his record nonstop flight said his time broke all land-plane distance speed records.<\/p>\n Hughes took off from Union Air terminal, Los Angeles, at 2:14 a.m. (5:14 a.m. eastern standard time) today and roared down across Newark municipal airport, 2,490 miles away, at 12:43:27 p.m. (eastern standard time).<\/p>\n Salute to Newark<\/p>\n The new record breaks his old mark of 9 hours, 25 minutes, 10 seconds, set last January 14.<\/p>\n Hughes roared away into the mists east of the Newark field after being sure he was identified but came back in a few minutes and circled the field at terrific speed, apparently in an outburst of exuberance at setting the new mark.<\/p>\n He set his fast ship down to earth at 1:11 p.m.<\/p>\n Hughes was smiling broadly as he climbed from the open cockpit to receive congratulations of field attaches.<\/p>\n High in the Air<\/p>\n \u201cI flew at 14,000 feet most of the way,\u201d Hughes said, \u201cwith my highest speed 370 miles an hour. I used about 200 of the 280-gallon load. I am very tired \u2013 a bit shaky.\u201d<\/p>\n Hughes, however, climbed out of the tiny cockpit without assistance and shook hands with friends who rushed out to greet him.<\/p>\n He said he had picked up a good tail wind from Kansas City on to Newark, and added that conditions in the sub-stratosphere had not bothered him.<\/p>\n That same newspaper article featured a photo of a rather intense-looking Howard Hughes and the caption \u201cHe burns the wind.\u201d<\/p>\n Further details of Hughes\u2019s record flight were printed by the Trenton Evening Times<\/em> the next day.<\/p>\n Here is a transcription of this article:<\/p>\n Hughes Sleeping after Record Hop<\/p>\n Millionaire Flyer Streaks from Coast to Coast in 7 \u00bd Hours<\/p>\n NEW YORK, Jan. 20. \u2013 (AP) \u2013 America\u2019s amazing, air-minded millionaire, the 32-year-old Howard Hughes, devoted himself today to sleeping.<\/p>\n The calm, wiry six-footer, who has traveled faster and farther than any other human being in history, was utterly tired from his \u201cwinged bullet\u201d feat of spanning the continent yesterday at a speed of 332 miles an hour.<\/p>\n \u201cMy next record will be some fancy long-distance sleeping,\u201d he said last night before retiring.<\/p>\n In his little plane, designed by his own engineer, Richard Palmer, and built in his own factory at Burbank, Cal., he flew 2,490 miles in seven hours, 28 minutes, 25 seconds, to break every existing airplane distance speed record in the world.<\/p>\n The only man who ever has flown faster than Hughes is the Italian, Francesco Agello, who traveled 440.6 miles an hour for less than two miles in a seaplane October 23, 1934. That record was set with an engine designed for about one hour\u2019s service.<\/p>\n Palmer met Hughes at Newark Airport. The two men shook their heads at each other.<\/p>\n \u201cI knew she was fast,\u201d Hughes told his chief engineer, \u201cbut I didn\u2019t know she was that fast.\u201d<\/p>\n Hughes is the outright owner of petroleum and manufacturing interests and estates in Texas, California, and elsewhere. He formerly was a motion picture producer. Among his pictures were \u201cHell\u2019s Angels\u201d and \u201cScarface.\u201d<\/p>\n And why does he risk his neck setting speed records? \u201cI like to fly,\u201d is his answer.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/a><\/a>