40 Facts About Richard Halliburton

Richard Halliburton disappeared at sea while attempting to sail the Chinese junk Sea Dragon across the Pacific Ocean from Hong Kong to the Golden Gate International Exposition in San Francisco, California.

Richard Halliburton was born in Brownsville, Tennessee, to Wesley Halliburton, a civil engineer and real estate speculator, and Nelle Nance Halliburton.

Richard Halliburton graduated from the Lawrenceville School in 1917, where he was chief editor of The Lawrence.

Richard Halliburton attended courses in public speaking and considered a career as a lecturer.

Richard Halliburton toured historic places in London and Paris, but soon returned to Princeton in early 1920 to finish his schooling.

Richard Halliburton's trip inspired in him a lust for even more travel; seizing the day became his credo.

The words of Oscar Wilde, who in works like The Picture of Dorian Gray enjoined experiencing the moment before it vanished, inspired Richard Halliburton to reject marriage, family, a regular job, and conventional respectability as the obvious steps after graduation.

Richard Halliburton liked bachelorhood, youthful adventure, and the thrill of the unknown.

Halliburton's father advised him to get the wanderlust out of his system, return to Memphis and adjust his life to "an even tenor" which for son Richard meant the humbrum, prosaic and dreary encased in a set routine:.

In 1922 Richard Halliburton witnessed the last ceremonial marriage of a Chinese Emperor, the wedding of Emperor Puyi to Empress Wanrong in Beijing.

Richard Halliburton wrote of the event in his memoir as follows:.

Richard Halliburton's fortunes changed when a representative of the Feakins Agency heard him deliver a talk, and soon Halliburton was given bookings for lectures.

In 1929, Richard Halliburton published New Worlds To Conquer, which recounted his famous swim of the Panama Canal, his retracing the track of Hernan Cortes' conquest of Mexico, and his enactment in full goat-skin costume, of the role of Robinson Crusoe in Alexander Selkirk's, "cast away" on the island of Tobago.

Richard Halliburton was acquainted with swashbuckling cinema star Douglas Fairbanks, Sr.

Weak in plot, romantic interest, special effects and dramatic incident, the film could hardly compete with 1932's outdoor blockbuster adventure Tarzan, the Ape Man with Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O'Sullivan or 1933's smashing box office success King Kong with Robert Armstrong and Fay Wray, and its poor reception encouraged Richard Halliburton to reconsider a screen acting addition to his persona.

Later, Richard Halliburton wrote a foreword to her book Flying Girl about the adventures she had in the air.

In spite of being exhausted, and their plane becoming less safe, Stephens and Richard Halliburton continued their eastward journey.

In India, Richard Halliburton visited the Taj Mahal, which he had first visited in 1922.

In Nepal, as The Flying Carpet flew past Mount Everest, Richard Halliburton stood up in the open cockpit of the plane and took the first aerial photograph of the mountain, and to the delight of an amazed Maharajah of Nepal, Stephens and Beinhorn performed daring aerobatics.

Stephens, for instance, during one aerobatic display, astutely aborted a slow roll the moment he realized that Richard Halliburton had not fastened his seat belt.

Richard Halliburton gave frequent lectures and even turned down offers; a radio company offered him the considerable sum of $500 a week for 26 weeks, "to speak on a beer program".

The house, built of concrete and steel, fortress-like in appearance, contains a spacious living room and dining room and three bedrooms: one for Richard Halliburton, which featured a wall-sized map of the world, one for Mooney and one for Levy.

The corporate sponsors whom Richard Halliburton approached thought the risks of the enterprise greater than its rewards.

Richard Halliburton himself suffered from a skin rash, the result perhaps of high anxiety, and nervous exhaustion.

Richard Halliburton sent four letters to subscribers from Hong Kong between November 20,1938, and February 16,1939; the fifth, he promised, would be sent from Midway Island.

Until then, Richard Halliburton had kept regular, if sporadic, contact with radio stations and trans-Pacific Ocean liners.

At first the Coast Guard at Hawaii delayed searching for the missing ship, possibly thinking Richard Halliburton staged his disappearance as a publicity stunt.

Missing at sea since March 1939, Richard Halliburton was declared dead on October 5,1939, by the Memphis Chancery Court.

Richard Halliburton's ghost is reputed to haunt his final residence, Hangover House, completed in 1938 by architect William Alexander Levy in Laguna Beach.

Richard Halliburton's most enduring relationship was with freelance journalist Paul Mooney, with whom he often shared living quarters and who assisted him with his written work.

Richard Halliburton admired English poet Rupert Brooke, whose beauty and patriotic verse captivated a generation.

Richard Halliburton intended to write his biography and kept ample notes for the task, interviewing in person or corresponding with prominent British literary and salon figures who had known Brooke, including Lady Violet Asquith Bonham-Carter, Walter de la Mare, Cathleen Nesbitt, Noel Olivier, Alec Waugh, and Virginia Woolf.

Richard Halliburton often described his attaching himself to a famous historic person or to a revered place, such as the Taj Mahal.

Richard Halliburton insisted throughout his career on the importance of travel abroad as a means of self-improvement and discovery.

Richard Halliburton was an advocate by example of the 'grand tour' championed by monarchs and the upper classes from the days of Henry VIII through to the Belle Epoque, and he championed the study abroad programs featured in the curricula of many colleges and universities.

Richard Halliburton wanted to be remembered as the most-traveled man who ever lived, but he was surpassed by the contemporary globetrotters and influences, Burton Holmes and Harry Franck.

For contemporaries Thomas Wolfe, F Scott Fitzgerald, Corey Ford and Ernest Hemingway, Halliburton held some literary appeal.

Television news celebrity and author Walter Cronkite, who heard him lecture in the mid-1930s, credited Richard Halliburton with steering him to a career in journalism.

Architecture historian and writer Ted Wells considers Hangover House, which Richard Halliburton commissioned, to be one of the "best modern houses in the United States".

The Richard Halliburton Papers are held at Princeton University Library and the Richard Halliburton Collection at Paul Barret, Jr.