The First Trust Company

The Farmers’ Loan and Trust Company may seem like an odd name for a firm that at one time had offices in New York, London, and Paris and served as trustee for many of America’s largest corporations. The name, however, reflected the objectives expressed in the company’s original charter. On February 28, 1822, the State of New York chartered the Farmers’ Fire Insurance and Loan Company “for the purpose of accommodating the citizens of the State, residing in the country, with loans on the security of their property (which cannot now be obtained without great difficulty) and to insure their building and effects against fire.”1 Commenting on Farmers’ charter seventy-seven years later, Francis S. Bangs noted “how delicately are the would-be borrower, from out of town, and his troubles referred to in this act of incorporation, which perhaps sets the mark for the kindness and consideration which so characterize the trust companies of this day in their dealings with the farmers of Wall Street.”2 Bangs’ comment suggests the magnitude of the transformation that trust companies underwent in the nineteenth century. By the time that Bangs’ wrote, both the economy and the company had evolved in ways that its founders could not have imagined.