Sugar, 60, oversees the $34-billion defense empire from a Century City high-rise that offers a sweeping view of L.A.
Looking out toward Los Angeles International Airport, he can make out Northrop's sprawling F/A-18 fighter-jet plant in El Segundo. Just to the south, there is the company's Space Park in Redondo Beach, where his engineers work in secrecy developing spy satellites.
From his large yet sparsely decorated office, Sugar also has an unobstructed view of his past and a reminder of how far he has come. In the hazy distance, Sugar can make out the South Los Angeles neighborhood where he grew up helping his parents run a beauty salon. In the hills at the opposite end is his current home in Bel-Air.
Publicity shy, Sugar rarely talks about growing up in one of Los Angeles' tougher neighborhoods.
Born in Toronto, Sugar moved with his family to Los Angeles in 1954. His parents, both high school dropouts from Canada, ran the beauty shop, near Western Avenue and Century Boulevard, after driving to California in an old Ford sedan. It took nine days, recalled Sugar, who was barely 6 at the time.
Although his parents never graduated from high school, having had to work because of the Great Depression, Sugar said he grew up in an intellectually stimulating household. His father excelled in math and always had the desire to be an engineer but "never had the educational opportunity to do it."
When Sugar turned 12 and was about to begin high school, the family moved to a home a few blocks from Northrop's aircraft-making factory on Crenshaw Boulevard
The neighborhood was "tough," Sugar said. Though gunfights were rare, teens wielding knives were not unusual, he said.
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The smartest kid
But among his classmates at Leuzinger High School, there was little doubt that Sugar would go far, though few would know how far.
"He was definitely the brightest person around," said Linda Lisiecki, a classmate who was in many of the "gifted" classes with Sugar.
He was also somewhat of an oddity. Baby-faced and nearly three years younger than most of his classmates, Sugar often found himself trying to talk his way out of scuffles with physically larger classmates.
Report-card days were the worst, Sugar recalled. "The one thing that you don't want to do is have someone pull your report card out of your pocket and find you had straight A's."
He often tried running away, but, Sugar said, "I quickly discovered I wasn't a fast runner."
