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THE CHICAGO BANKER
December 5, içoS]
the appropriation is exhausted. Such bankers cannot last always. A few position funerals will improve the situation.
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booklets for some of the Chicago banks. Many of the special paragraphs which he incorporates are admirable. For instance:
44 A ®^NK *s a public institution. It guards I*- the funds of the public on the one hand and is regulated by the public through the law 011 the other. As such its standing and condition is of concern to the public. The good business man will not fail to reassure himself on these points when he forms a bank connection.”
^/'-YLD fashioned banking meant prudence, ^ extreme care, repudiation of speculation, right principles. To this extent it should be held to uncompromisingly by every banker. But often, also, it meant narrow-mindedness, failure to appreciate merit in any man except according to his bank balance. We look for ability and character first, and for an increase in bank balance after.”
ttTF the goods one buys at a dry goods store A seem satisfactory there is no occasion to examine into the concern’s record and standing. But this is not so in dealing with a bank. A bank has the custody of one’s funds and in large part of one’s financial standing. It is absolutely vital to a business man to form good banking connections.”
literature and is making it a great success. There may be others, but him we know.
Cashier.
est in all the temporal affairs of the bank and its patrons. To get the benefit of this organization Mr. Teter has sent out the following letter:
ktOOME time ago we wrote you, calling your O attention to the facilities afforded by the Chicago Savings Bank and Trust Company for the transaction of a general banking business. We now take this opportunity of speaking especially of the individual service which we render our depositors, by reason of the fact that the officers give their personal attention to all of the affairs of the bank. This institution—the only bank on State Street, was established with the definite object of providing banking facilities for those located in the immediate vicinity. The steady growth in the number of our depositors is an indication of the adequate manner in which we are meeting their requirements. Trusting that we may be favored with a portion of your banking business, we remain.”
A LITTLE compliment was paid to banks not issuing house organs in this column recently, by stating that the Nebraska courts had enjoined a Nebraska bank from embarking in the publishing business because it was not authorized by their charter. The bankers to whom we threw the bouquet had sense enough to keep out of such a trivial method of advertising. Several papers have taken the matter up seriously and are saying illnatured things about the subject in general.
IT is no worse to spend the bank’s money to advertise the cashier and his social friends and to exploit the depositors than to run in traveling expenses chargeable to advertising, and then tell the legitimate paper man that
THE Northwestern National at Minneapolis will do us all a favor if it will hereafter take in only non-advertising banks. Trouble is that no one seems to want them. The latest is the amalgamation of the Swedish-American National and “Sunny Jim” Latta, all at once. A few weeks ago it was A. A. Crane and the Commerce. The Northwestern now has (first of the week) $29,000,000 in deposits, which gives it a metropolitan aspect and places it almost in a dominating position for the heavier of the new Northwestern business.
COUR rather prominent young business men A of Chicago, after spending all of Sunday and half of Sunday night at one of the convivial athletic clubs, playing indoor base ball with highballs, started for home in a big automobile via the red-light district. By the time they had reached the residence district they had become so used to the color that a red light displayed upon a brick pile in the street as a danger signal had little significance and all of them went to the hospital and the auto to the scrap heap. The moral is to beware of many things, taken in improper sequence or combination.
'T'HE new paid secretary for Nebraska, Wm. •I B. Hughes, is out in a $500 reward offer for the burglars who broke into the Farmers Bank, at Page, Neb. This is the real plan and when the A. B. A. puts up rewards for arrests instead of Christmas gifts for the Pinkertons, bank burglary will be out of style.
׳T'HE tall young man who presides over the A destinies of the Chicago Savings Bank and Trust Co., Lucius Teter, has made it a specialty of his administration as president, that the bank officials take actual part, actual inter-
when we are considering our own banking system and our own gold reserve we shall do well not to look to the systems prevailing in other countries, but har^e regard to our own peculiar position as financial center of the world, and as the country which possesses the most highly developed system of deposit banking. It is not my purpose to-night, even if time permitted, to speak at length on the question of our gold reserve, on which I have so often addressed you.
Yet the facts are worth noting that to meet the increasing demands of trade, the Bank of France, in 1906, increased the maximum amount of their authorized note issue; and in the same year the tax-free note issue of the Imperial Bank of Germany was also raised. Moreover, the stock of gold held in the Bank of France has been increased during 1908 by approximately £19,750.000; that in the Reichs״ bank by £15.000,000; that in the Bank of Russia by £10,750,000; that in the Associated Banks of New York by £20,000,000; that in the Austro-Hungarian Bank by £3,500,000: and that in the Bank of Italy by £9,250,000. In the same period the holding of the Bank of England has only been increased by a little under £2.000.000. It is worth noting these facts.— Sir Felix Schuster, before the Institute of Bankers, London.
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The Bank of Hunterville
T. T. Choat was appointed vice-president, and W. J. Ransom cashier of the Bank of Hunterville, N. C.
Banking Systems should Suit Needs of Each Country
The United States have sent a commission over to Europe to report on the various European banking systems with a view to subsequent legislation in their own country. Many of us have been glad to welcome representatives of the commission, and to render them such assistance as was in our power. We look forward to their report, and we hope to learn much from the impressions they have gathered. The urgency of the need for legislation in the United States has no doubt been recognized in consequence of the crisis of last year; though I have never had the slightest doubt in my own mind that it was not the banking system, but quite different causes, which brought that crisis about.
No banking system, however good, can prevent the evils arising from excessive speculation and over trading. At the same time, the crisis could certainly have more easily been faced with a more elastic banking system ; and the United States government is no doubt right in its determination to deal with the defects, which were then exposed. That the commissioners v׳ere able to learn much in Europe is not improbable, but in devising a system for their country they will no doubt not entirely model themselves on any European example, but study their own needs and their own methods and habits.
Every nation, in my opinion, must have a banking system suitable to its own commercial conditions and the habits of its people. And
New Bank for Haddon Heights
Efforts that have been made and are now being made by the prominent business men of Haddon Heights, N. J., and the surrounding towns to organize a national bank, to be located at Haddon II eights, indicate that there will be such an institution established by the first of the year. Haddon Heights has a population of about 1,500.
The situation has been canvassed by a committee, which has reported that it has already been promised $14,000 of the $25,000 necessary to start the new bank. The par value of the new stock will be $100, of which $50 is payable on or before January 1st, the balance within five months thereafter. Subscription lists are now in the hands of the following: Clemens Titzck, Harold E. Rogers. William A. Lindsey, Howard FI. Evaul, Edw. I. Deibert, Frank B. Jess, and George B. Hood, all of Haddon Heights: FI. D. LeCato, Audubon, and James Davis, Clementon.
The Lincoln County National
The Lincoln County National of Shoshone, Idaho, has been authorized to begin business with $30,000 capital. Joseph Keefer is president, Gus B. Keefer, vice-president, and Gilber T. White, cashier.
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The Bank of Jacksonville
The Bank of Jacksonville, N. C., has elected M. M. Capps, president: M. J. Heyer and E. W. Summersill, vice-presidents, and George Bryan, cashier.