Hello all, This was posted to another list - could be of interest to some of us ;] Jana ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ There's a new area of Irish info material I've been promising myself to look into. I don't know if you ever heard of the Immigrant Savings Bank in N.Y.C. It was founded, during the Irish influx, by a group of educated Irish business men. As I said, most of the Irish could not read or write. They lived in crowded quarters. They worked and tried to save money. The problem was, where to hide the money so it would be safe. Putting it under the mattress was unsafe because that's the first place a crook would look. The bank opened with a different way of making deposits and withdrawals. When doing business, the Mick had a code he gave the teller. He gave his name, verbally, and perhaps his mother's maiden name. There were about 3 or 4 different, personal, pieces of family info on his ledger card. Sometimes, the village or county he migrated from was listed. Needless to say, the bank became a big success and is still in business today. Recently, the bank wanted to utilize the basement space the old records were stored and was making plans to throw them out. Fortunately, someone with a brain in his head stepped in and put a stop to the plans. The N.Y.C. Public Library was contacted and asked if it wanted the records. It said, "Yes". Its taking time for the library to sort out the records so they can be accessed. However," They say the records are in pretty good shape and have quite a bit of info, that maybe cannot be found elsewhere". ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I seem to recall first catching wind of this about a year ago.... But, this post is brand new... If anyone learns the status of plans to make these records available, would you post it to the list, please?