The following article is by my good friend, Tom Fiske:
There was no Grand Canyon trip for me as others on this Blog have taken. And I went to a lot of trouble recently to release my birth certificate on the Internet for the 
very first time, but no one in the media took notice. They were all looking at some one else’s birth certificate. So I turned to a web page I am putting together for my old pal Howard.
There’s no doubt about it: Howard is dead – been dead for over ten years. We were good friends and I miss him a lot. I have been promising myself that I would put up a web page on the Internet in his honor. There is not enough about him on the ‘Net right now.
I knew Howard’s second wife and had met three of his children, so I knew there would be a lot of material. But I had no idea how much work this one web site was going to be.
The web site page is about finished and is not a work of art, but a work of genealogy. I had to determine when he was born and where, whom he married and where, what jobs he had held over a long career in psychology, and much more. Of course, I grew curious about a few things, like any genealogist. These had to be followed up.
As he grew older, Howard looked just like the movie actor, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. I wondered why he had not gone into the movie business. He had an IQ that was at the top of most people’s charts. Why not follow that up with a career in physics or cosmology, instead of being a college professor of psychology (I mean no offense to psychologists)? There were many questions, but few answers.
Anyway, after digging through my family’s past for thirty years, I felt adequate to the task of writing a few paragraphs about Howard. I thought genealogy was good training for such things.
Here are some of Howard’s achievements/activities: he was the author of three books. He was told by two thugs that if he wanted to live he would have to testify for Benjamin (Bugsy) Seigel in court. He taught a course at Purdue University with Dr. Lillian Gilbreth (mother of twelve children in the book and movie, Cheaper by the Dozen). He was personally asked by President Roosevelt to help out a sculptor (for whom he became an agent). He worked for Gen. Curtis LeMay during WWII and selected ten B-29 bomber crews for emergency missions. His number three choice flew the Enola Gay and dropped the first atomic bomb. Of course Howard didn’t know what was on the planes.
In California psychological circles he was the director of this and the manager of that. He lived on Catalina Island for a time while working for Phil Wrigley (who owned most of the Island). Later, Howard retired to a ranch in the Santa Barbara area where movie and TV personalities also lived. There, he was part owner of a winery that produced truly wonderful wines.
It is a long interesting list, only part of it is shown here. Naturally, each item had to be checked, where possible (I would check on these items even if my brother were involved. Especially, if my brother were involved.) So I did all that.
The work made me miss ole’ Howard. It was always exciting to work with him. But I might not want to hang around with him again. And when it comes to writing about people, I think I will stick to the more prosaic farmers and bootleggers in my own family. No one cared what they thought about gangsters, and only two of them were murdered.
Which reminds me – Bugsy Seigel was acquitted without Howard’s testimony and the thugs did not return, so Howard could breathe again. It was a harsh time in his life. Siegel went on to help establish Las Vegas and Howard went on to teach at USC. Now that I am about finished with the website page, I am going to be able to breathe again, too.