Zapata Off-Shore Co. - 1960's dated $1,000 Specimen Bond - Changed Name to Zapata Norness Inc.
Inv# SE3682 Specimen Bond
$1,000 4 3/4% Specimen Bond printed by Security-Columbian Banknote Company.
Zapata Off-Shore Company, officially established in 1954 as a subsidiary of Zapata Petroleum, was founded a year earlier by future U.S. President George H.W. Bush and business partners J. Hugh and William C. Liedtke. Named after the Marlon Brando movie Viva Zapata!, which was a popular film at the time, the company focused exclusively on the high-risk and rapidly growing sector of marine oil exploration. Under Bush’s leadership as president, the Houston-based company made significant strides in early deep-water drilling technology. In 1956, they commissioned the Scorpion, the world’s first electrically powered mobile jack-up rig, designed by R.G. LeTourneau. In 1959, Bush acquired the Liedtke brothers’ stake, effectively splitting Zapata Off-Shore into a fully independent corporate entity. This move resulted in a relocation of its primary operations from Midland to Houston, providing the company with closer geographic access to the Gulf of Mexico.
Stock and Bond Specimens are made and usually retained by a printer as a record of the contract with a client, generally with manuscript contract notes such as the quantity printed. Specimens are sometimes produced for use by the printing company's sales team as examples of the firm’s products. These are usually marked "Specimen" and have no serial numbers.
Ebay ID: labarre_galleries