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H.M. Victor would have a difficult time recognizing the bank he founded in 1908 in North Carolina. Victor's Union National Bank has grown into First Union Corporation, the nation's ninth largest bank holding company, based on assets of $86.8 billion at September 30, 1995.
First Union has more than 1,200 banking offices in seven South Atlantic states and Washington, D.C., making it the nation's fourth-largest branch banking network, with 33,000 people serving a customer base of more than 8 million. Through nearly 200 offices in 37 states across the nation, First Union also provides other financial services, including mortgage banking, home equity lending, leasing, insurance and securities brokerage services. First Union also has the nation's eighth largest ATM network.
That's a quantum leap from the superregional's modest beginnings in the Buford Hotel on Charlotte's Tryon Street not long after the turn of the 20th century.
H.M. Victor raised funds to start Union National Bank by selling 1,000 shares of stock at $100 each and by setting up his office on a rolltop desk in the hotel's main lobby. He soon earned a reputation as a conservative banker who always confirmed his customers' creditworthiness before making a loan. For years, Victor even refused to make loans on the newly invented automobile. When he finally relented with a loan on a Model-T, he held the owner's keys and title until the loan was repaid.
As Union National - and, much later, First Union - grew, it maintained a reputation for high credit quality, strong financial performance and excellent customer service. It was this viability that kept the bank opened during the troubled 1930s, when the Depression closed many others.
In the decades that followed, the bank pioneered many areas with its innovative approach to growth.
For example, Union National Bank was the first Charlotte bank to open a branch office in 1947. It later was the first to offer a flat-fee checking account, the first to offer a charge card -- even before the advent of Visa and MasterCard -- and in 1986 was the first in the nation to link its branches by satellite for data transmission.
In 1958, Union National's management, led by President Carl McCraw Sr., saw that the future of banking lay in a strong branching network. With a young manager named C.C. Hope, McCraw traveled to New York to study mergers. (Hope was later to become vice chairman of the corporation, president of the American Bankers Association and a director of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation before his death in 1993.)
McCraw's and Hope's studies paid off later that year, when Union National merged with First National Bank and Trust Company of Asheville, forming First Union National Bank of North Carolina.
By 1964, First Union further diversified by acquiring Raleigh-based Cameron-Brown Company, a national mortgage banking and insurance firm. It was this acquisition that enabled First Union to become one of only a few banking companies in the nation that are able to offer a full line of insurance products and mortgage products in all 50 states. Cameron-Brown, which took the name First Union Mortgage Corporation in 1986, is among the nation's 15 largest mortgage banking companies based on mortgage servicing volume.
The late 1960s brought more organizational change, as First Union formed a bank holding company in 1968. Cameron-Brown's founder, C.C. Cameron, became chairman of the new First Union Corporation. And in 1973, Edward E. Crutchfield, then age 32, became president of the bank. At that time, he was the nation's youngest president of a major U.S. banking company.
In 1985, Crutchfield had also succeeded Cameron as chairman and chief executive officer of First Union Corporation. That year, he led an expansion program that encompassed Northwestern Financial Corporation of Greensboro. The merger, North Carolina banking's largest, created the state's second-largest bank and First Union's flagship banking operation.
In 1988, First Union's national presence was sufficient to warrant listing its stock (FTU) on the New York Stock Exchange. Previously, First Union stock had been traded over-the-counter.
Between 1985 and today, First Union has used its powerful foundation to grow from a $7 billion- asset bank to an $87 billion-asset bank through 60 mergers with banks and other companies in North and South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Virginia, Maryland, Tennessee and Washington, D.C.
By seeking partnerships with other organizations with compatible managements and philosophies, First Union has maintained its reputation for financial performance and quality products and service. As the operations of the acquired banking companies have been consolidated, First Union has achieved efficiencies by standardizing products, procedures and automation systems.
During these growth years, First Union's transition has been strengthened by such leaders as Frank H. Dunn, recently retired chairman and CEO of First Union National Bank of North Carolina, and Malcolm E. Everett III, the North Carolina bank's current chairman and CEO; Byron E. Hodnett, CEO, John A. Mitchell III, chairman, and G. Kennedy Thompson, president, of First Union National Bank of Florida; Harald R. Hansen, chairman, and David M. Carroll, president and CEO, of First Union National Bank of Georgia; Sidney B. Tate, chairman, president and CEO of First Union National Bank of South Carolina; Robert L. Reid, chairman, president and CEO of First Union National Bank of Tennessee; and Benjamin P. Jenkins III, president and CEO of First Union National Bank of Virginia. And the mergers also added the talents of B.J. Walker, formerly of Atlantic Bancorporation, who is vice chairman of First Union Corporation.
First Union's sales, marketing and customer service programs have the support of John R. Georgius, president of the corporation. Georgius helped develop the Quality Customer Service and Total Quality programs, which have become industry-wide models.
Under the quality programs, First Union constantly trains employees on improved techniques for customer service and sales. Says Georgius, "There should be no question that First Union is one of the finest sales-driven, service-oriented organizations in the United States."
First Union Corporation was profiled as one of the "101 Companies that Profit from Customer Care," a book citing "role models for the new American manager." The highly acclaimed book praises First Union for its quality program, for its aggressive "mystery shopping" program by an independent firm and for its in-depth market research into customer definitions of service.
In 1995, First Union was selected by Working Mother magazine as one of the "100 Best Companies" for working mothers in the nation.
Next let's visit the International Trade Center.
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