New Britain Herald Newspaper, November 18, 1927, Page 38

PLANS OF COMMERCIAL TRUST | NEW BRITAIN DAILY HERALD, FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 18, 1927, OFFICIALS OF BANK |OPENING OF NEW BUILDING BUILDING ALLOW EXPEDIENCY IN BANKING TRANSACTIONS| and Ease of Oper- Mix With Materi In Facility ation Excel- lence of New Institution. banking 1 nd tr class t prior Counter Arranzement West Side Fittin st side in-| tions, nd change nts, paying 1 tment. it on the discounts. | o found An- railing of imported is found Waiter M. those oc- s, assist- of person- Aministra- | r, Jr., as- ge of! depart- : X .\m.; apiece, swhich it depart- rooms uippe most privacy. Be- 1d towards the e President’s Offic ey red furnitur nk is of a modi- Passerini, office of Stan- charge located in < is equipped | signal but- itors in the run- on the credit tric Allison, t with rtment telepho bookkeeping d als 1t of Miss ] rranged, €0 Ldna Smart, Margue Politis, Ann Pet wel Crowe. ach desk is Fori eniers 4 nere. | n off of | are | i for con-| | | | geway to t elevator to the left door is a wwble stair- | d through way, leads where Mr. te office. American | furnitur of indus of. the the | desk of man- a specially | View of the interior of the new Commercial Trust buil from the rear of the main floor. 7ill light the room. Ghe RBanking Lobby ing “banking lobby™ taken Note the two large chandelie purchased at $1,800 Ghe Officers’ Rooms | At the front of the main banking room of the Commercial Trust building will be the othe o found the officers’ \quarters, as shown above. Allison & ! drawers and work table, designed and finis to harmonize with the ral s of th shing: for a loan sk of an led to in- mer's re- P lows is a borrow- light shade of fan sts with A duplicat- [ the wa r note of st iy grill work buz isement s a an out- |itseli. A well 1 emporarily | gleaming with white of conver- carefully matel n the cot- while | ing, tion by floor. Al in floor 1y leads thick i by a partition ! hoxes ¢ Jdeposit vaults. Th ation public and window space 1 combination lo s and puck 1 provided with glass specially d partment is presided |ers for Hum, custodian of | The 1 sto vaults, Arthur tmer wed in the basement, with the same also lo cquipped r' | C less counters, marble ound on the Her ire found Polish, Ttal Swedis Lithuanian, topped, mor floor. speakin square reinfc steel. Two entrances Jewish, are el by on Page 3A) ult proper. i 4 in There found coupon hooths, o in forcign exchange department, | " | New Dritain and Kiwanis clubs. type of | as| FROM ALL CIRCLES John Loomis, Pardon Rickey,| Wm. Bassford, at Head !‘ John C. Loomis | The history of the Commercial | Trust company, which institution is !now opening its new $750,000 bank-, ling house on West Main street, is interwoven with the New Britain| | history of John C. Loomis. Mr. Loomis is from Windsor, Conn., and for eight years with |the Aetna National bank. He also was connected with the Windsor {Trust Co. ! Mr. Loomis has seen service in the banking business. ined the Aetna National Hartford as a runner at a salary of a weck. Today he is the active d exccutive head of the Commer- Trust Co. whose building, its architect declares is “the finest bank | in eastern United States i 28 years of He| Mr. Loomis is a director of, and was for two years president of, the | |Chamber of Commerce. He is a Ro- tarian, a member of the New Brit- | ain, Hartford and Shuttle Meadow | clubs, and of the various Masonic organizations, including the 32nd degree, having served for some time | as treasurer of the Aziz Grotto. He | is a director of the Masonic Temple | corporation and of the Elihu Bur- | vitt corporation. 1t was during his wdministration as president of the Chamber of Commerce that the lat- ter organization started the drive which produced the Burritt hotel. | He also is a director and vice pres- ident of the People’s Savings bank. He is a member of the New Brit- ain lodge, B. P. O. E., and a director of the Connecticut Chamber of Com- merce, also. Pardon C. Rickey Pardon C. Rickey, executive vice ! president and trust officer, is a na- tive of Chicago and graduated from estern university at Evans- ton, 1ll. He is an expert account- ant and for years was comptroller of the Long Bell Lumber Co, said i0 be the largest in the countr He is the author of the uniform system of accounting now used by the vari- ous branches of the National Lum- | ber Manufacturers' association During the World war he an advisory capacity with the Fed- eral trade commission in Washing- ton and was closely associated with the Treasury Department in formu- | lating incom regulations. | prit 1, 1919 he became treas- urer of Landers, Frary and Clark, which position he held until his res- | ignation a short time ago to enter| the bank in a newly created posi- tion. | mereial Trust | Elihu Burritt Co., treasurer of the hotel corporation, | president of the Rerlin Homes | suilding Co., and a director of Goss | and De Leeuw Machine Co. He is a | director and chairman of the finan committee of the Masonic Temple corporation and has taken all Ma- degrees up to and including nd. ! He also is a member of the New Britain and Shuttle Meadow club Walter M. Bassford ! Walter M. Bassford, treasurer, fs | hative of Waterbury. He entered empley of the Waterbury Trust | a runner after his graduation | from high school, It was a young | bank and he v up with the bus-| iness, going through all departments | | until he became in urn teller, book- | | keep discount clerk, assistant ltreasurer and finally treasure resigned to open an automobile agency. He came to the Commerctal | ‘rast Co. as discount teller in May, | i Later he became assistant | treasurer and in February, 1927, he | ceded Charles W. Hawkins as| asurer. He is a member of the| Loufs S. Thomas To Louis §. Thomas, assistant main banking | treasurer in charge of administra- | employes|tion detail and personnel, PruidemI rench, | Loomis gives all the credit for the|field school. He entered the employ | Ger- satisfactory completion of the new | |bank. Mr. Thomas had complete |supervision of the structure, and | modern {trance hall {addition to the | the banking | hronze | throughout. | Loomis. It OCCURS NEAR ANNIVERSARY OF COMMERCIAL TRUST CO. MUCH MATERIAL USED FOR BULDIN { Seventy-Five Miles of Wire in Bank Structure Fifty-six offices comprise the four upper floors of the new Commercial Trust building, now ready for occu- bank of | pancy and which will be opened £0r | at the same tige. Suturday desc siness et he building, banking section of which is found in another column, is seven stor es high, the lower floors heing used by the bank and the four upper i00rs 1 of ‘he for offi % (fi the upper floors contains containing from 243 to 542 square feet cach. Each offic has hot and cold running water an lavatory arrangements are found on every floor. Corridors in marble, and the building is fire- proof throughout Floors are accessible hy marble stairway or elevator from an é€n- west of the bank en- trance. An entrance to the bLank also opens from this vestibuls The building was constructed b; | the H. Wales Lines Co. of Meriden. Work was started in June, 1926, In Indiana limestone used in the front 184,000 bricks, with depressed pat- tern of the bank's insignia, made in | Tlinois. | e building has 75 miles of elec- tric wire, of which 49 miles used in the vaults. There werc used 5.200 barrcls of cement; yards of sand; 2,300 tons of gravel wnd 390 tons of structural steel Eleven carloads of marble, some of it coming from as far is Ttaly, and weighing more than 250 tons, were used in the building. Eighty tons of this m were used in department alone. A tons of ornamental furnishings were used Hardware was furnish ed by the Russell and I} Window casements are of heavy rolled gteel scctions and were made by David Lupton's Sons & Co. of Philadelphia. Two luxurious chan- Qeliers, cogting ahout $1,800 apice were designed by rd ¥, Cald- well & Co. way total of R —————— He is a director of the Com- | anc of the time and labor saving | of his own design. The electric light signals supple- menting the phone system and the electric code system arc his own d sign, and he was required to instruct the electrical engineers how 1o in- stall them. “There is not @ six- teenth of an inch space in the whole structure which M uas has not personally approved.” said Mr. is not generally known that Mr. Thomas made the archi- tects change a large portion of the plans affecting the bank proper be- cause they did not come up to his requirements. Louis Thomas is a native of Bridgeport and began his banking ecr with the Conn | bank there 14 years ago. He went through all the departments up to paying bank and the appliances are National Bank of Bridgeport. Ior two ars he was with the national b examiner, working from the federal reserve district of New York city He came to New Dritain three years ago as loan and discount tell- er after two years with the Chase National bank of New York Edwin P. Lamphier, Jr. Edwin P. Lamphier, Jr.,, businces extenglon manager, was born in Winsted. He attended Gilbert High school, Worcester academy and Suf- of the First National bank ot Win- (Continued on Page 3A) ‘ lard, Verna Re- Marion Schroedel, Vera Johnson, Trene Heisler, Catherine Ralph, Anna kis, Sophie Symolon, Beatrice Dwyer. First row standing—William E. Pease, Eaxl Carlson, Hildur Carlson, Linnea Bengston, Julia Pitkonis, Marion Smith, Alice Forsell, Anna Sliney, Mrs. Beatrice Carlson, Margaret Curran, Joszephine Tutles, Helen Ahlstrom, Robert Stabert, Eugene Horvath, Raymond Fraprie, Sig- fried Nordgren. Second row standing—Joseph Caliendo, Georze Cook Paul Anderson, George Blinn, Edor Anderson, Arthur W Hum, Anthony Sarraceno, Margaret Allison, Joseph Volz, Elizabeth Abramovwicz. © | ported total facade, there are | 00 c 1,700 cubic | win plant. | cticut Nation- | 1 receiving teller in this | Organization Twelve Years Old and a Month to Spare — Growth Re- corded. | The opening of the new Commer- al Trust company | West Main street building on tomorrow will be {in the nature of a dual celebration {inasmuch as it will be a house- warming and a birthday party all While it ry date, it is just is not the exact anniversa L few days more than a mc om the 12th birthday anniversary of t} institution, and the double party hus en arr d to commemorate both [ the birthday and the | the new home. | October 11, 1915 the Commiercial | Trust company opened its doors for | business. re the expiration of nk re- esources of $207.000, ,000 had been paid in The first depositor Kanrich | The new bank attracted to itself many people who hitherto had not elt the need for a banking institu- [tion, and the institution grew as tha | city grew. Within two years its re- sources had mounted o more than a million dollars and its original quarters had proven inadequate, The officers at that tims of James M. Curtin, president; In ld MeMillan, vice president; John . Loomis, treasurer, and George A, adwell, secretary, The building at 274 Main street, built for a business place original and adapted to the needs of the at its opening, was purch v authorization of the Lank dire tors in 1917 and and remodeled 1918 th removal into the first day's business the & of which § consisted was enlar resourees hiad mount- million and a hal later 1t was appu Main strect location, although in use only five Jarged | and remodeled as it had been, S small so was al- yeurs, en- becoming 100 {rapidly that a new homs most an immediate necessity. The officials of the St. Mark's copal church were planning the present new edifice, and the bank officials purchased the site of the old structure on West Main strect, | Building operations began in 1026 {In October, 1025, the old building {was sold to Isaac Rothfeder for | $137,500. | The assets of the bank continued to increase at the rate of approxi- mately a half million dollars a year funtil at the close of husiness Octo- {ber 10, 1927, the total assets were $6. 451.60, includes a number of departments, amor them being the commere Christmas club, fore exchange, |insurance industrial loan. invest- ment securitics, trust and other de- | partments. It ha clients In June, 1924 President |vice p presidency, holds, deposit, today more than 23,000 | upon th Curtin, Mr. Loomis, then dent, succeeded to the which position he now, death of HOLD-UP MAN TO0 FIND HARD GOING Arrangement of Gounters Defies ‘ Gunmen Any attempt to rob the Commer- cial Trust Co. in its new bank build- ing on West Afain street would ba | found a discouraging job, so thor- oughly protected against robbery is this new bank. At any counter in the entire bank where a man might be tempted to aim a pistol, he would be forced because of the counter construction to aim it shoul- der high. This act in itself would give the man behind the window time to act. The would-be robber would at all times he in plain sight of 15 or 20 bank officials and em- ployes. Over his head, where he could not reach or intimidate her, but within plain sight and cquipped to give an instant alarm, he would find a telephonc operator. Under the counter in every compartment 13 a little trigger, which by an al- most imperceptible movement of the foot of the man or woman stand- ing there would immediately sound the alarm and call the police. Sneak thieves would be frustrated because of the counter construction, which makes it impossible to reach the counter on the teller's side from the patron’s side. Under various counters where large sums of money arc hound to accumulate are stecl lockers, includ- ing cabinets and drawers, mounted on wheels. These cabinets are wheeled onto the clevator and to the burglar proof vaults each night. In the vault two large stecl doors, weighing 13 tons each, and 16 inches thick of different grades of steel one layer on another, make drilling almost impossible. In ad- dition thers are built into each vault several sound accumulator: After a glven number of sounds, such as hammer blows, or those made by a drill, have been made, these accumulators automatically set off the police alarm on the out- side of the bauk and at police head- quarters. So delicately are they balanced that if a man were acci- locked in the vault, the mere raising of his voice to a shout would give the alarm. In this casc, the telephone oper- ator at the central exchange would make a direct connection special telephone in the vault and (Continued on Page 3A) with & | the home of one of the bank offi- | ®omnm e