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THE CHICAGO BANKER
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the bankers behind the nation, or the nation behind with the bankers. If a ruler of a nation wished to go into a war with another nation that had knocked a chip off his shoulder, he had to step around and see his banker first; and if we were to get down to the real facts and definitely decide who was entitled to have the words “First in war, first in peace, first in the hearts of his countrymen” applied to a class as they have been applied to George Washington, now, as a man, the answer would be the banker. We all need you in our business, and we need you badly!
While banks and banking have had their part, and a most prominent part, too, in history, thev have not been overlooked in poetry and song. We all remember that interesting bank statement recorded in Annie Laurie in the words, “Maxwel-ton’s banks are bonnie,” also Bobbie Burns’ “Banks and braes of Bonnie Doon.” The writer of “I Stood on the Bridge at Midnight,” must have been well fortified financially, as he must have had a bank at either end of the bridge to hold it up.
I told a banker friend recently, in a talk about the new fittings of his office, that he might make his customers forget their troubles by having little poetic couplets over the various departments; for instance, over the receiving teller, “Who enters here leaves “soap” behind.—Dante.” At the paying teller’s window he could put, “Are you out on payroll ?—Dooley.” At the discount window, “Off agin, on agin, gone agin, Finnigen,” would be appropriate, and at the collection clerk’s window could appear, “There’s a chiel among ye takin׳ notes and faith he’ll presint ’em.” Something like this would undoubtedly make customers feel that the worst had not come—yet.
Seriously, gentlemen, I wish to have you know how greatly you are appreciated in this community, and how glad we are to have our city honored by your gathering. To my mind, the banks and the bankers are the heart of the commercial world, and through it and by it the whole character of commercial life in a community is shaped. Like the functions of the heart, there is the flow of money into the bank, and it is sent out through the various channels to give life to business of all kinds. If the heart action is not good, or impurities get into the stream, the whole commercial body is affected. A bank, like the heart, to be most useful must be active, and always on the alert to help and give strength where it is needed.
F. C. Nunemacher, president of the Louisville Board of Trade, in a splendid address to the Kentucky convention
As I look about me, I can see several faces before which I could be exceedingly eloquent on things, finance in general, and my own in particular ; whereas, in the presence of this whole congregation, I would be almost struck dumb if I had to specialize on the same subject. However, as I am to speak of banks and banking in general and not establish a confessional here, I may be able to get through without serious mishap.
Banking is one of the most ancient customs, and we read of it away back at the beginning of all things. The first definite record, however, of banks and banking seems to be when Noah landed on the bank at Mount Ararat; it being said that it was necessary for him to do this because at that time all the other banks had practically gone into general liquidation. It seems that the dove had made several trips after clearing before it brought the “green back” to show that it was still in circulation ; and while there was evidence that everything else on earth had been watered extensively, there were some securities somewhere that would do to bank on when Noah found them.
It is said that Noah immediately followed the idea suggested to him by the general liquidation that had been going on for forty days (and nights), and transferred all he had to the bank, and proceeded to “water” all the “stock” in his possession. There had been no check on the rain for days, and the notes on the water gauge were more than dew. Such heavy drafts had been made on the resources of the ark that Noah had to go to protest in spite of himself. Some historians say that all accounts at the time were very much overdrawn. After the beginning of the banking at Mount Ararat, we find banks cutting no small figure in the history of the world. Moses is said to have done a little banking on his own account at a very young and tender age, when he was identified by Pharoah’s daughter at the Bank of the Nile. (This was the Nile Bank, not faro bank.) Jonah left the bank in the lurch as he thought, but, like everybody else, came back to it after he had shown the whale that it was impossible to keep a good man down.
In all the story of the world, we have either
I certainly appreciate, to the greatest degree, the privilege of speaking to this gathering of men who represent to such a large extent the honor and integrity of our commercial world. It has troubled me somewhat to decide in my own mind why your program committee should have invited me to speak to you, but after considering many reasons that suggested themselves, I have come to the conclusion that they, in their wisdom, followed the line of thought that guided a convention of railway superintendents some years ago. They were investigating the code of signals that are made by brakemen and other employees with hand and lantern in indicating to the engineer whether he should go ahead or back the train, etc. Instead of bringing one of their most expert brakemen or railway employees before them, what did they do? They went into the woods as far as they could from a railroad and got a farmer who, perhaps, had never seen a train until he came to town, and they put him on the platform before them, and asked him what signs he would make if he wanted the train to go ahead, or stop, or back up, and all the other things. Wonderful to relate, the motions he made with his ham1s naturally, to indicate his wishes, were found to be almost identically the same as those that had been used by the railroad employees for years; and as I am strongly convinced that your committee must have asked me to talk to you about banking because I know so little about it, I trust that the result will be as gratifying as the experiments of the railway superintendents with the other farmer.
You will pardon me when I say that talking to bankers is to me very much like talking to womankind, not because the banker is lacking in any degree in masculinity, but for several other reasons. It is to be acknowledged that they all possess good looks, (if not personally, they have them in their wife’s name for safe keeping, perhaps), and one wishes to make a favorable impression on both. Secondly, while it is said there is “safety in numbers,” you would all, I am sure, prefer to talk to one woman or one banker at a time. You can make much better progress with one, and have so much more comfort, you know, and what you might say to one fair being you would not care to shout to a whole roomful; and in the case of the banker you would much prefer to tell your tale of woe to one banker in his private office, than to several at once.