Kidnapped!
In June of 1974, Walt Helmerich, III, was kidnapped and held for ransom. He was stopped on his way to work one morning by a man in a hard hat posing as an employee of the local gas utility. He said there was a gas leak in the area, and asked Helmerich to turn off his ignition. After he did so, he felt a gun against his neck. The kidnapper told him to move over, got in, and drove him to the Utica Square parking lot where he put him in another car, then bound and blindfolded him. Helmerich convinced the man to call Vic Thompson, the president of Utica Bank, rather than his father, who had a heart condition. Thompson informed the FBI, then went to the elder Helmerich's office to tell him as gently as he could. The kidnapper drove around with his victim on the floor of the car, giving instructions on how and where the ransom, $700,000 — was to be delivered. It was loaded into five sacks and placed in the elder Helmerich's car. The FBI then stuck a beeper to the undercarriage.
After several false starts, Walt Helmerich drove with Ila Bright, Helmerich's secretary, later that same day to 141st and Peoria, where he had been instructed to leave the ransom under a bridge. One bag fell into the water. After it was retrieved, they got back into the car and returned to the office. As they drove down 141st Street, they had noticed an apparently disabled truck that had a flat tire. Unknown to them, the man fixing the tire was an FBI agent taking down the license numbers of all the cars that passed by.
The kidnapper picked up the money from under the bridge, taped Helmerich's hands to his ankles, and let him go. Nearly eight hours after the ordeal had begun, a family in a pick-up stopped, untied him and released him.
Several times while he was held captive, the Helmerich & Payne president and CEO had said, "I've got a summer league basketball game at 7:00 –– my son Hans will be playing. I hope this is wrapped up before then." He made it to the game on time.
The $700,000 ransom, the largest ever paid in Oklahoma, was recovered the next day at the home of Freddie Delbert Smith, who had been located through the license plate number written down by the FBI agent with the flat tire.
H&P International Drilling: A Major Player On The Worldwide Stage
Drilling has always been a central part of the Helmerich & Payne story — driving iron and steel into the earth to extract the precious fuel the world runs on. Beginning with a single Star 29 cable rig in north Texas, the company grew to become a leading player in the international drilling arena..