14 Hoosier Banker June 2016 The 1960s began with buoyant optimism, flush with the prosperity of the previous decade, yet yearning for a “new frontier,” as coined by America’s youngest commander-in-chief, President John F. Kennedy. Within the span of 10 years, the nation would experience sweeping advancements in civil rights, medicine, education, job training and the sciences. By 1969 the American frontier had stretched literally to the moon, when Purdue graduate Neil Armstrong laid the first human footprint on the lunar surface. The 1960s also marked a loss of 1916 - 2016 YEARS HOOSIER BANKER HERITAGE: 1960-1969 innocence. JFK was assassinated on Nov. 22, 1963; only five years later, his brother, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, also was gunned down, less than two months after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. The loss of Dr. King was traumatizing for the emerging civil rights movement, beset with struggles against deeprooted resistance. Disillusionment also resulted from countercultural experimentation, at times giving way to substance abuse and drug overdoses, including those of young celebrities. And certainly the Vietnam War had a powerful impact on the decade, televising the horrors of armed conflict into the American psyche. If fashion mimics identity, the pronounced contrasts from the start of the 1960s to the end underscored seismic cultural shifts in mores, lifestyles and values. Within a few years, the neatly coiffed hair and classic clothing of the early ’60s had exploded into psychedelic colors and “down-to-there hair,” as expressed in a hit Broadway musical. Yet the decade had its lasting victories, woven into and around the swirling events and dramas that define it. Through it all, the banking community continued to serve its customers, rising to the challenges of an early-decade recession and latedecade inflation. Industry milestone events include passage of the Bank Protection Act, the Truth in Lending Act and the Fair Housing Act. The decade also saw the conversion of Fannie Mae into a publicly traded governmentsponsored enterprise. A technological breakthrough in banking came in 1969, when Chemical Bank in Rockville Center, New York, advertised: “On Sept. 2, our bank will open at 9:00 and never close again.” The bank had installed the first U.S. automated teller machine. t 1960 Mary Kay Kurker,American Fletcher National Bank and Trust Company, Indianapolis, wore a skirt depicting magnetic ink characters at a demonstration of the bank’s new IBM reader-sorter. 1961 A total of 4,500 visitors attended the grand opening of the auto bank branch of First National Bank of Elkhart. 1962 Clean lines were the focus in the newly remodeled lobby of Citizens Bank, Michigan City.
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