On November 24, 1971 a passenger who identified himself as "Dan Cooper" boarded a Northwest Orient 727-100 plane bound from Portland, OR to Seattle, WA. (Due to a press miscommunication, he became forever known as "D.B. Cooper".) Cooper sat in seat 18-C.

During the flight, Cooper handed a stewardess a note demanding $200,000 in unmarked bills and two sets of parachutes - two main back chutes and two emergency chest chutes. The money and chutes were to be delivered when the plane landed in Seattle. Once the plane landed, the passengers were released and the ransom and chutes were brought onboard. Cooper ordered the flight crew to remain onboard. The $200K ransom was in 10,000 $20 bills, which weighed approximately 21 pounds. A microfilm "picture" of each individual bill was taken by the F.B.I. before it was delivered, creating a record of each bill's individual serial number.

After refueling, careful examination of the ransom and parachutes, and negotiations regarding the flight pattern and the position of the aft stairs upon take-off, Cooper ordered the flight crew to take the hijacked jet back into the air at around 7:40pm. The crew was ordered to fly to Mexico City, at a relatively low speed of 200 mph, an altitude at or under 10,000 feet (normal cruising altitude is between 25,000 and 37,000 feet), with the landing gear down and 15 degrees of flap. However, First Officer Rataczak told Cooper that the jet could only fly 1,000 miles under the altitude and airspeed conditions ordered. Cooper and the crew discussed other possible locations, before deciding on flying to Reno, Nevada, where they would again refuel. Cooper then ordered the pilot to leave the cabin unpressurized. An unpressurized cabin at 10,000 feet would curtail the risk of a sudden rush of air exiting the plane (and ease the opening of the pressure door) if he were to attempt to exit the aircraft for a subsequent parachute landing.

Somewhere during that flight, Cooper opened the door, lowered the aft stairs and jumped out of the plane - never to be seen again.

On February 10, 1980 an eight year old named Brian Ingram on a family camp-out found 294 bills totaling $5,880 on the banks of the Columbia River (five miles NW of Vancouver, WA). The bills were 40 feet from the water and approximately two inches below the surface. After review, the bills were determined to be part of the Cooper ransom money. Here is an F.B.I. communication:

Authorities eventually allowed Ingram to keep a split of about $2,860 of the recovered money, with the amount being a rough estimate because of the badly deteriorated condition of the bills. The insurance company that paid the ransom were also given some of the bills, which they can no longer locate. No other bills from the ransom were ever found in circulation.

This partial bill was purchased from Brian Ingram through an auction house. The serial # of this bill appears on the F.B.I. list of the ransom bills.

I underlined the bill in the farthest column on the right.

Pretty cool, huh.