Howard Robert Hawkins

Title

Howard Robert Hawkins

Authors

Description

Howard Robert Hawkins was born on February 11, 1916, in the tiny Pulaski County community of Star City, Indiana. Raised on his family’s 600-acre farm, Hawkins graduated from Pulaski High School in 1934. After high school, Hawkins enrolled at Indiana University where he received his B.S. degree in 1938. He then enrolled at the Indiana University School of Law where he served as a student editor of the Indiana Law Journal (v.15-16). He graduated, Order of the Coif, and received his JD degree in 1941.

From law school, Hawkins joined the Federal Bureau of Investigation. After FBI training in Washington, D.C., Hawkins was sent to the bureau’s New Haven, Connecticut, office. Just as he was settling in to his new life in New Haven, the war broke out. He was immediately sent to New York City where he spent the war years, as a Special Agent in charge of a counter-espionage radio station that communicated with German intelligence. This covert operation was later depicted in the film “The House on 92nd Street,” for which Hawkins served as an advisor.

After the war, Hawkins accepted a position with the RCA Corporation as an assistant general attorney. Over the next 30 years, Hawkins rose through the corporation until he became CEO and Chairman of the Board in 1972. Hawkins oversaw RCA's rise as a global telecommunications giant and was instrumental in the establishment of RCA’s satellite communications network. After leaving RCA, he spent 1980 to 2000 as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of American TransCom, a communications and business ventures consulting firm.

Howard Robert Hawkins received the Indiana University Distinguished Alumni Service Award in 1969 and was inducted into the Indiana University School of Law Academy of Law Alumni Fellows in 1994. Although he lived on the east coast his entire adult life, Hawkins continued to manage his family’s Pulaski County farm until 2002. Hawkins died on August 8, 2003 in Greenwich, Connecticut, at the age of 87.

Keywords

Maurer Alumni, Academy of Law Alumni Fellows, Federal Bureau of Investigation, FBI, House on 92nd Street

Disciplines

Communications Law | Law | Law Enforcement and Corrections | Legal Biography | Legal Profession

Files

Comments

Learn more about Howard R. Hawkins at the following sites:

A copy of the 1945 film The House on 92nd Street, is available at the Circulation Desk of the Jerome Hall Law Library.

Howard Robert Hawkins
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