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Wednesday, August 11, 2021 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon
Crime historian conducts dig
for D.B. Cooper case evidence
VANCOUVER, Wash.
(AP) 4 Nearly 50 years after
skyjacker D.B. Cooper van-
ished out the back of a Boeing
727 into freezing Northwest
rain 4 wearing a business
suit, a parachute, and a pack
with $200,000 in cash 4 a
crime historian is conduct-
ing a dig on the banks of the
Columbia River in Vancouver,
Washington, in search of
evidence.
KOIN reports that Eric
Ulis, a self-described expert
on the infamous D.B. Cooper
case, began a two-day dig on
Friday. Ulis and four volun-
teers are searching for evi-
dence about 10 to 15 yards
away from where a boy found
$6,000 of Cooper9s ransom
money in 1980. Ulis said his
theory is that Cooper buried
the parachutes, an attaché case
and the money at the same
time, but dug smaller holes
instead of one large one.
The case of Cooper has
become infamous, not only
in the Pacific Northwest but
also in the country. The FBI
Seattle field office called the
investigation one of the lon-
gest and most exhaustive in
the agency9s history.
On November 24, 1971,
the night before Thanksgiving,
a man described as being in
his mid-40s with dark sun-
glasses and an olive com-
plexion boarded a flight from
Portland to Seattle-Tacoma
International Airport (Sea-
Tac). He bought his $20
ticket under the name <Dan
Cooper,99 but an early wire-
service report misidentified
him as <D.B. Cooper,99 and
the name stuck.
Sitting in the rear of the
plane, he handed a note to a
flight attendant after takeoff.
<Miss, I have a bomb and
would like you to sit by me,99
it said.
The man demanded
$200,000 in cash plus four
parachutes. He received
them at Sea-Tac, where he
released the 36 passengers
and two of the flight atten-
dants. The plane took off
again at his direction, heading
slowly to Reno, Nevada, at
the low height of 10,000 feet.
Somewhere, apparently over
southwestern Washington,
Cooper lowered the aircraft9s
rear stairs and jumped.
He was never found. But
a boy digging on a Columbia
River beach in 1980 discov-
ered three bundles of weath-
ered $20 bills 4 nearly
$6,000 in all. It was Cooper9s
cash, according to the serial
numbers.
Over the years, the FBI
and amateur sleuths have
examined innumerable theo-
ries about Cooper9s identity
and fate, from accounts of
unexplained wealth to pur-
ported discoveries of his para-
chute to potential matches of
the agency9s composite sketch
of the suspect.
In July 2016, the FBI
announced it was no longer
investigating the case.
Editor9s note: In 2011,
Marla Cooper, who grew up
in the Brooks-Scanlon log-
ging camp in the early 1970s,
visited town. She had par-
ticipated in an ABC News
interview in which she pos-
ited the theory that her uncle
Lynn Doyle Cooper of Sisters
was the man known as D.B.
Cooper. The interview and
Cooper9s visit sparked a bit
of Coopermania in Sisters.
Read the story at bit.ly/
NuggetCooperCase.
The Law Offi ce of
JOHN H. MYERS, LLC
— Downtown Sisters —
In the
PINES
By T. Lee Brown
Where is
Sisters
Country?
Call it <the Sisters area=
or go for <Sisters Country,=
a successful marketing tag-
line rolled out by the Sisters
Area Chamber of Commerce
a while back. I like calling it
Sisters Country. Our home.
Where we live and work and
play. Where the heck is it,
exactly?
Bill Bartlett mentioned
in last week9s issue of The
Nugget that it might be
defined by the borders of
Sisters School District.
I respectfully disagree.
Wherever The Nugget covers
news and community? That9s
Sisters Country, and it most
definitely includes Camp
Sherman, Suttle Lake, and
environs. The term Sisters
Country is big enough to
encompass our neighbors in
Jefferson County, zip code
97730, and Black Butte
School District.
Speaking of boundaries:
Did you know that Sisters
Parks & Recreation District
(SPRD) and Sisters School
District (SSD) do not share
the same borders? Some
local parents might not real-
ize that, until they go in to
sign up for SPRD camps 4
only to discover that their
family9s address is con-
sidered part of Redmond9s
parks and rec. Even if you9re
an active part of the Sisters
community and your kids
attend school here, you
might not fall under SPRD9s
rubric. Out-of-district people
can still participate; it costs
more.
I asked Jennifer Holland,
SPRD9s executive director,
what9s up with that. <This is
a very common question,=
she assured me. <Sisters
Park & Recreation District
is called a 8special district.9
We have our own district
lines that, while are similar
to SSD, are not the same.=
Apparently it9s often
seen in special districts,
including the one Holland
worked for before moving to
Sisters (Willamalane over in
Springfield). SPRD9s bound-
aries were determined back
in 1998, when the special
district formation was on the
ballot for voters to approve.
<Many factors go into
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deciding the district bound-
aries including needs for
services and who is likely
to support the measure,=
Holland said. <As you know,
Central Oregon has changed
a lot in the last 20-plus years,
so what was true then may
not be true today.=
To change district lines,
SPRD would need to float
a ballot measure to <annex=
specific areas. Those specific
areas would then be subject
to SPRD-supporting prop-
erty taxes. <There have been
conversations with myself
and the board on the poten-
tial need for this, as there
are pocket neighborhoods
who are in the SSD bound-
aries but not ours,= Holland
explained.
<Future steps remain to be
seen,= she said. <However, I
do believe it will be a topic
during our next strategic
planning process.=
The board of SPRD
cannot, alas, tell us where
exactly Sisters Country is.
Maybe we should put that
question on the ballot, too.
But who would get to vote
on it? Only the residents of
97759? Or the wider swath
of Sisters Country?
That was a joke, folks.
That9s not a ballotable issue.
So I9ll just keep using the
term in an inclusive and
vague kinda way. Shout-out
to my friends in 97730!
www.skiinn.com
…For your support and
patience as we add staff
and refi ne our service
during the post-COVID
tourist season.
— The Ski Inn Team