Pub. 3 2015 Issue 4

10 The Community Banker www.mibonline.org FEDERAL RESERVE BANK OF MINNEAPOLIS, HELENA BRANCH T he Federal Reserve Sys- tem, authorized by the Congress and signed into law as the Federal Reserve Act by President Woodrow Wilson in 1913, had been in existence for five years when the System’s Board of Governors in Wash- ington, D.C. authorized the creation of 18 branch banks. The Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis was not authorized to establish a branch at that time, even though the Ninth District was then the third largest in total geographic area. Upon learning of this develop- ment, Norman B. Holter, a prom- inent Helena businessman and an original member of the first Board of Directors of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, immediately started a campaign to establish a branch in Helena. Holter, together with several Montana bankers and the support of the Associated Banks of Helena, was successful, and a full-service branch in Helena was authorized in 1920. This achievement was particularly notable as the population of Montana at the time was small and dispersed. Helena itself boasted only slightly more than 12,000 residents, making it the smallest city in the United States to accommodate a Federal Reserve bank or branch. It con- tinues to hold this distinction today. To house the Branch, the Minneapolis Fed purchased the original Foidel Undertak- ing Company building at the corner of Park and Edwards streets. This building sustained substantial damage in the 1935 earthquake and so, following approval from the Board of Governors, construction of a new Branch building began at the corner of North Park Avenue and Lawrence Street (currently the site of the Reserve Financial Center). The Branch relocated to this new facility in 1938. It served its purpose well until operations finally outgrew the facility, and construction of a new building was approved and construction completed in 1990. The current Branch facility, located on Neill Avenue, sits where the original Great North- ern Depot was located. It serves as a sophisticated anchor for the northern boundary of Helena’s downtown area, and provides an important connecting corri- dor to the Great Northern Town Center. When the Branch opened in 1921, it offered a variety of ser- vices to Montana’s commercial banks, including the handling of currency and coin; collection of checks, drafts and coupons; transfer of funds; payment of War Savings Certificates and stamps; lending to member banks; fiscal agency responsi - bilities for the U.S. Treasury; and examination of state member banks. Over the decades, ser- vices have been added, discon- tinued, expanded, and changed to accommodate the evolving payments system, legislative changes, and technology ad- vancements. Technology and legislative developments over the years drove drastic changes in check processing at the Branch, including the early introduction of automation with IBM proof machines in the 1940s, and a vast expansion of check volume with the implementation of the Monetary Control Act in the 1980s which expanded Federal Reserve services on a priced basis to all financial institutions, as well as the introduction of magnetic ink character recogni- tion technology (MICR), which enabled computerized check processing. Notably, the Branch devel- oped and launched its EPIC® (Electronic Presentment/Image Check) pilot program in 1997. This pilot was conceived to promote fully electronic image supported check processing in Montana. The EPIC project gained national attention, and one important element – the pilot’s Image Replacement Featured Associate Member