How similar are these three: Howard Hughes, Tony Stark and Erik Prince?
Apparently a lot, at least more than everybody thinks. All of them lost their fathers very early, between 16 and 25 years old. We don’t know for sure about Iron Man but it’s very plausible that it happened when he was a teenager!
The second similar factor is that all of their fathers were businessmen and inventors. Hughes’ dad was the founder of “Hughes Tool Company” and invented a drill bit for digging through rock. Erik Prince’s father founded “Prince Machine Corporation” and patented a sun visor that could light up and sold it to General Motors. Tony Stark’s dad was a successful inventor and founder of “Stark Industries”.
Hughes,Stark and Prince inherited their fathers’ business, successfully expanded them and then used it as a platform for their own endeavours. All of them share the same love of planes or just plain flying in the case of Iron Man. Mr. Hughes was a famous aviator. On September 13, 1935, Hughes, flying the H-1 that he had built, set the world speed record.This was the last time in history that the world airspeed record was set in an aircraft built by a private individual. Mr.Prince, who has flown since he was 16 and later had a fleet of 25 planes during his time as CEO of Black Water, recently purchased Africa based Kijipwa Aviation.
All three were government contractors, made a fortune, were under investigation and went through a congressional hearing. An interesting fact is that all allegations were dropped but all three had their own losses during that period. The most significant fact is that these individuals are successful entrepreneurs that were always capable of handling a big game.
Other similar qualities they share are stick-ability and persuasion. Stark didn’t give up when he was captured by terrorists in the Middle East and built his Iron Man costume, Hughes was in hospital almost paralyzed after his second plane crash and still was able to keep inventing. As he lay in his hospital bed, he decided that he did not like the bed’s design so he called in plant engineers to design a customized bed, equipped with hot and cold running water, built in six sections, and operated by 30 electric motors, with push-button adjustments. The bed served as a prototype for the modern hospital bed in common usage today. Prince, after his fight with congress, negative public opinion and personal tragedies was able to reinvent himself as a large scale entrepreneur. He worked for a sheik in an United Arab Emirates built security company and then relocated to Hong Kong. Beijing has ambitions to tap Africa’s resources — including $1 trillion in planned spending on roads, railways and airports by 2025 — and Prince will play a crucial role in this huge endeavor as CEO of the logistics company hired to transport the goods and provide medevac helicopter in case of emergency in Africa.
Despite the fact that Iron Man is a fictitious character he was defiantly created based on a real life story. The question is who’s story will be an inspiration for the next generation of Tony Stark. Why not yours?
- I.G.K.
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