Part 54, page 100

Transcript

The scan is the source; the transcript is machine-generated from it.

FD-350 (Rev. 9-77)

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Sunday, Nov. 27, 1977 Vancouver, Wash.

The COLUMBIAN

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Few drawn to Cooper Caper

By COLUMBIAN STAFF, AP ARIEL — Skies were overcast and people almost as scarce as D.B Cooper, himself, as this community near Mount St. Helens held its second annual party in honor of the legendary skyjacker's disappearance Saturday. Only a handful of people gathered around a steaming cauldron of buffalo stew at the Ariel Store and Tavern. And inside the tavern where another 30 people were gathered, beer flowed more freely than talk of old D.B., who either pulled off one of the greatest swindles of the age or died trying. Cooper parachuted from a Northwest Airlines jet with 10,000 $20 bills somewhere near Ariel, 10 miles northeast of Woodland, on Thanksgiving Eve in 1971. Not one of the bills has turned up, and there has been no trace of the man who gave his name as Dan Cooper when he bought the ticket that carried him into legend. The Cooper Caper, as it is called, is sponsored mainly by Vince and Germaine Tricola, owners of the Ariel Store and Tavern, with the assistance of such people as Dave Butterfield, publicity chairman and chief stew stirrer, and a few others. The avowed purpose of the celebration, aside from commemorating the fete of skyjacker Cooper, is to bring a little prosperity to the settlement of about 250 people who in ordinary life do such things as work in a shingle mill.

As one resident put it: "We hope Cooper will show up and spend some of those $20 bills." But Cooper did not show up Saturday and no one seemed particularly surprised. "I've been looking, but I haven't seen him yet," Butterfield said, grinning as he stirred the stew. "We'd like him to show, but he probably won't. He's one of the few truly free men — if he's alive. I kinda think of him as being like Robin Hood." Despite six years of sleuthing, the FBI says it does not know who Cooper is — or was. Some people think Cooper's bones may be in Lake Merwin, which is right next to Ariel, or in the dense woods in the immediate area.

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(Mount Clipping in Space Below)

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SEARCHED ______ SERIALIZED ______ FILED ______ FBI — SEATTLE DE 6 1 1977

[Checkboxes/stamps]

Classification: 164-81 Submitting Office: Seattle

Title: Character: or

Date: 11/27/77 Edition:

Page: 21 The Columbian Vancouver, Wash.

(Indicate page, name of newspaper, city and state.)

SV/2

b6 b7C

DB Cooper-23026