Involvement With Howard Hughes
Real met Howard Hughes in November 1957, while working at Lockheed and became Hughes' personal adviser. In May 1965, Real was one of the figures involved in Hughes Helicopters bid to the US government for what became the Hughes OH-6 Cayuse. It is reported that Howard Hughes directed his company to submit a bid at a price below the actual production cost of the helicopter, in order to secure this order, resulting in substantial losses on the US Army deal, with the anticipation that an extended production cycle would eventually prove financially viable.
In 1971 Hughes pleaded with Real to leave the Lockheed Aircraft Company and reorganize his troubled helicopter company. Real was looking forward to retirement, but out of loyalty to Hughes he accepted the challenge. In 1979, three years after Hughes' death, Real became president of the troubled Hughes Helicopter, accomplishing over four years one of business history's most impressive corporate turn-around efforts. While heading the company, he also guided the development of the AH-64 Apache helicopter program for the US Army. The program was so successful that in 1984 he oversaw the sale of Hughes Helicopters to McDonnell Douglas and became president and CEO of that company until his retirement in 1987.
On Thanksgiving Eve 1970, Hughes suffered from a bout with pneumonia. Jack Real arranged for Hughes to be secretly moved by aircraft to the Bahamas. After his death, one of Hughes' bodyguards, Gordi Margulis, was quoted as saying that Real and Hughes often spent hours on the telephone talking about aviation. He said, "Jack was a really great guy who cared about Howard and did everything he could to help him."
In retirement, he played a key role in relocating the Spruce Goose to the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum in McMinnville, Oregon where he was Chairman and President from 1995-2001.
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