Oberlin Banks, 1863-1985 (span)
| Oberlin College Archives
Administrative/Biographical History
Oberlin had one bank, the First National Bank (organized in 1863) and its successor under the name Citizens’ National Bank (organized in 1882), until the Oberlin Banking Company was formed in 1889. The Citizens’ National Bank of Oberlin closed in November 1904 as a result of losses sustained from the Cassie Chadwick swindle. (For a brief history of this incident and of Oberlin’s early banks, see A Standard History of Lorain County, Ohio, edited by G. Frederick Wright, 1916, Vol. I, pp. 503-506.) The Northern Ohio Bank and the State Savings Bank both opened in 1904, and the People’s Bank Company formed in 1906. In 1923 the Oberlin Bank Company merged with the State Savings Bank Company to form the Oberlin Savings Bank, which opened in October 1923 in the former Goodrich Book Store in Oberlin. It opened branch offices in Kipton and South Amherst in the late 1950s, Wellington in 1966, and Carlisle Township near Elyria in 1971. It last operated in Oberlin in 1985 or 1986.
Oberlin Savings Bank Presidents
A. H. Johnson 1889-1912
H. C. Wangerien 1913-1932
? Fauver 1933-1942
J. L. Edwards 1943-1945
F. W. Tobin 1946-1948
Walter Nord 1949-1950
Paul A. Warner 1951-1965
William P. Davis 1966-1969
Raymond D. Campbell 1970-1980
Herbert J. Billington 1981-1986
Author: Anne Cuyler Salsich Forms of Material (links to similar genres) Administrative Information
Subgroup I. First National Bank, 1863-1882
Comprises 28 volumes of records such as a cash book, foreign bills of exchange, journals, ledgers, registers, morning statements, and tickler files. Use microfilm copy.
Subgroup II. Citizens’ National Bank, 1882-1904
Comprises 37 volumes of records such as journals, ledgers, registers, receipt books, signature book, tickler files, and weekly deposit balances. Use microfilm copy.
Subgroup III. Oberlin Savings Bank, 1905, 1911-21, 1923-25, 1933, ca. 1950s-1985, n.d. (0.4 l.f.)
The materials include historical information on the Oberlin Savings Bank’s response to the banking crisis of 1933. The photographic materials include a negative of the bank’s front door with a closure sign by order of the federal government. Other photographs document the bank’s main building in Oberlin and its branches in Carlisle Township, Kipton and Wellington, and its employees. Two folders hold reprints of historical photographs of Oberlin, many of which are copies of images in the Oberlin College Archives.
Subgroup IV. Northern Ohio Bank, 1904-06 (Subgroups IV through VI in 0.2 l.f.)
Comprises bylaws and minutes in a bound volume, and copies of clippings and manuscript pages.
Subgroup V. People’s Banking Company, 1926, n.d.
Comprises two copies of a twentieth anniversary booklet published in 1926, and a household tips booklet, undated.
Subgroup VI. Historical Information, 1964
Contains a booklet published in 1964 entitled “Banking in Lorain County, Ohio, 1818-1954,” and clippings about personnel at the Lorain County Savings and Trust Co.,
Oberlin.
Subgroup VII. Microfilm (2.50 l.f.)
27 rolls of original and silver duplicate film of records in Subgroups I and II.