Calgary

"The pool-of-light technique was not, by the way, entirely a Des¬ marais original. A version of it was used earlier in the decade on Calgary millionaire Max Bell, a major shareholder in Canadian Pacific Railway. He owned The Albertan, a now-defunct Calgary daily news¬ paper whose editorial offices and presses were on land leased from Canadian Pacific’s Marathon Realty. Marathon was going to raise the lease rates on the land by a substantial amount, and Bell went to see Rod Sykes, Marathon’s man in Calgary (and a future mayor of the city), to protest, argue, and maybe browbeat his way out of the increase. Calgary legend has it that Sykes, at the time a man of substantially less power than Bell, greeted Bell with the pool-of-light technique, defusing and diffusing the power that Bell was trying to bring to bear on him. He steadfastly refuted Bell’s arguments and veiled threats, saying the increase was for the good of the shareholders. Bell gave up the fight and eventually lauded Sykes to the CP board for his performance."

"The other big coup was a surprise package sold by the oil company Amoco. The oil giant had a subsidiary, Canadian Marine Drilling Ltd. (Canmar), in the Olympic city of Calgary. Now nearly ten years since the Olympic games, the city did not have the same pressure, and it was even longer since the oil boom marked the Canadian interior. Canmar was sitting with two drillships, a couple of drilling platforms, a handful of supply ships, and various other equipment. Normally, not many buyers want such a mixed bag, but the oil giant Amoco did not want the hassle of lengthy negotiations for one ship at a time. All or nothing, was the offer. And Fredriksen's rig broker, Stein H. Schie at Normarine Offshore, got the job. He played hard on Amoco's desire to get rid of the whole of Canmar and managed to get the price down to just over 100 million dollars. Then Schie did the job Amoco should have done: One by one, the assets were sold off. The supply ships and a dock brought in 50 million dollars. Thus, John Fredriksen had gotten back half of his money, and was left with the two drillships "Northern Explorer II" and "Northern Explorer III" for just 50 million dollars."