Tompkins County Bank (Ithaca, NY)

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Cool Presence of Mind Often Helped Bankers Avert Panic; Camp's Word as Good as Bond

The soundest of banks, such as those in Ithaca have always notably been, have back in their history some amusing little anecdotes of public hysteria which flared up in times of financial panic.

In two or three such instances, related with appropriate chuckles by the worthy gentlemen who ran Ithaca's banks in an earlier generation, it was only the cool presence of mind of bank officials that headed off what might have been disastrous consequences.

During the infancy of the Tompkins County Bank, while Col. Hermon Camp was still serving as its first president, the financial chaos resulting from the panic of 1837 became acute throughout the land. People in Ithaca began to catch the contagion and became worried about their deposits.

Finally a delegation of heavy depositors called upon Colonel Camp and demanded to know the condition of his bank. money in cash or as a cashier's check. Inwardly he quaked, for he knew there was less than $10,000 in the till!

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Word Was Bond

"We want our money," some of them cried.

"Gentlemen," the colonel replied unflinchingly, "go to your homes. You have my personal guarantee that every Tompkins County bank bill you hold is good for its face in gold."

And, as the historian asserts, "They went. The bank might not be sound, but Camp was, and his simple word better than their bond."

Some 20 years later, in the money panic of 1857, another story is recorded that the Tompkins County Bank was about to fold up, and that the first depositors to demand their money would get it, but those who came later would encounter empty vaults.

Great excitement was the result. When the bank opened Monday morning, a frenzied crowd gathered in front. Suddenly through its ranks a wheelbarrow made its way, trundled by none other than Josiah B. Williams, former state senator and outstanding business man of the community.

Williams Cashes Checks

The wheelbarrow was laden with bags. He pushed it into the narrow private lane alongside the bank and stopped. He took the bags and entered the bank. Ten minutes later the main doors were flung open. The crowd surged in and waved checks for full payment of their deposits.

Mr. Williams, white-bearded and substantial, stood inside the teller's window and began cashing the checks from two large heaps of coins, one of gold and the other silver. The crowd was astonished at the sight, and relief began to show itself in every face.