History
The institution most frequently identified as the first modern savings bank was the “Savings and Friendly Society” organized by the Reverend Henry Duncan in 1810, in Ruthwell, Scotland. Rev. Duncan established the small bank in order to encourage his working class congregation to develop thrift. European voluntary organizations and “friendly societies” provided the inspiration for their state incorporated American counterparts.
These first savings banks were envisioned as philanthropic endeavors, designed to uplift the poor and working classes. The banks were started by philanthropists, who took on the positions of savings bank trustees, managers, and directors as opportunities to teach the working class the virtues of thrift, and self-reliance by allowing them the security to save their money. The first incorporated US mutual savings bank was the Provident Institution for Savings, in Boston. Its 1816 charter was the first government legislation in the world to safeguard savings banks.
Since the 1970s, when the industry was deregulated, thousands of mutual savings banks have been converted into stock ownership companies, raising more than $40 billion. In 2010, only about 600 remained. These conversions have often resulted in large financial rewards for top bank executives.
Read more about this topic: Mutual Savings Bank
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“We are told that men protect us; that they are generous, even chivalric in their protection. Gentlemen, if your protectors were women, and they took all your property and your children, and paid you half as much for your work, though as well or better done than your own, would you think much of the chivalry which permitted you to sit in street-cars and picked up your pocket- handkerchief?”
—Mary B. Clay, U.S. suffragist. As quoted in History of Woman Suffrage, vol. 4, ch. 3, by Susan B. Anthony and Ida Husted Harper (1902)
“Certainly there is not the fight recorded in Concord history, at least, if in the history of America, that will bear a moment’s comparison with this, whether for the numbers engaged in it, or for the patriotism and heroism displayed.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Man watches his history on the screen with apathy and an occasional passing flicker of horror or indignation.”
—Conor Cruise O’Brien (b. 1917)