“Pages of history” features excerpts from The News Journal archives including the Wilmington Morning News and the Evening Journal.
March 13, 1933, Wilmington Morning News
Roosevelt says banks ready to reopen
President Franklin Roosevelt told the nation last night that the banking system was ready for reopening today on a progressive basis and asked for renewed confidence and faith by the people.
“Let me make it clear that the banks will take care of all needs,” he assured.
Catching a spare moment almost for the first time in his eight busy days in the White House, the President used the press and the radio to tell the people in his own words of what was done and what he intends to do.
He promised the assistance of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation and of Federal Reserve member banks to make sure of the opening of sound state institutions outside the Federal Reserve. The new currency now being pushed into the far corners of the nation for needs of the citizenry he described as “sound.”
He scored those bankers who “had shown themselves either incompetent or dishonest” and asserted: “It was the government’s job to straighten out this situation, and do it as quickly as possible – and the job is being performed.”
Warning that some banks might not be reopened, he asked that no concern be felt if an institution is not immediately restarted and explained it probably would be opened shortly….
“Confidence and courage are the essentials of success in hurrying out our plan,” he said. “You people must have faith. You must not be stampeded by rumors or guesses. Let us unite in banishing fear. We have provided the machinery to restore our financial system; it is up to you to support and make it work.”…
State licenses awaited to permit opening banks
Wilmington’s payroll requirements will be met in currency beginning today by member banks of the Wilmington Clearing House Association, an official said last night following a meeting of the association.
Meanwhile these member banks are preparing to resume full operations tomorrow under licenses from the Federal Reserve system which are expected by tonight….
The city banks today will operate with the exception of meeting payroll demands, exactly as they did the latter part of last week….
Responding to President Franklin Roosevelt’s request that gold be returned to the Treasury because of the banking crisis, Mrs. Irenee duPont has sent to the Wilmington Trust Company a number of gold coins she has treasured for sentimental reasons over a period of years. Her husband, writing to Elwyn Evans, executive vice-president of the trust company, explained thus: “These are an accumulation of director’s fees paid me during the last 20 years, which, in accordance with custom, I turned over to my wife.”
OLD BANKS, NEW USES:Want to dine in a bank vault? See how old banks became a home, a salon and a restaurant
March 16, 1965, Wilmington Morning News
LBJ asks prompt right-to-vote law
President Lyndon Johnson declared last night that is time to guarantee every American the right to vote – to answer the “cries of pain, the hymns and protests of oppressed people…”
In solemn, measured tones, the President called for broad new legislation and paid tribute to the Negro demonstrators he said have awakened America’s conscience.
Johnson said he will put his proposals into the hands of Congress in legislative form tomorrow, and he awarded them No. 1 priority.
Before a joint session of House and Senate – a forum normally summoned for a presidential State of the Union address or in time of grave national crisis – Johnson declared: “…It is wrong, morally wrong, to deny any of your fellow Americans the right to vote in this country.”…
CATCH UP ON HISTORY:News Journal archives, week of Feb. 13
March 18, 2008, The News Journal
Financial crisis deepens
The Federal Reserve is taking unprecedented steps as it battles a full-blown financial crisis: invoking rarely used legal authority to lend directly to investment banks, helping finance the bargain-basement sale of Bear Stearns to JP Morgan Chase and making the steepest interest-rate cuts in its modern history.
As the Federal Reserve meets today to consider yet another deep cut in the short-term lending rate that influences a broad swath of consumer and business loans, fears are growing that even its most aggressive efforts may not be sufficient to ease an unprecedented global credit crunch and to keep the U.S. economy and world financial system on track….
Despite reports, Wilmington Trust not at risk
It’s a familiar yet wearisome damage-control routine for Wilmington Trust: A plane crashes or a company collapses and the financial press jams the bank’s phone lines, wondering what the crisis will bode for the bank’s financial future.
This time it was an 85-year old investment firm that crashed, and once again Wilmington Trust strained to explain the most opaque part of its business….
After news broke that Bear Stearns on Sunday had sold itself to JP Morgan Chase at a fire-sale price of $2 a share – down from $170 a share last year – Wilmington Trust scrambled to reiterate that it provides custody for a lot of Bear Stearns stock, but it doesn’t actually own any of it….
Reach reporter Ben Mace at rmace@gannett.com.
