The First 150 - The First Tennessee Story - 1864-2014 by Contemporary Media

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Selected works of art from the First Tennessee Heritage Collection are presented throughout these pages, identified with the bank’s logo. Just as this book salutes the 150-year history of First Tennessee Bank, so these works celebrate the long and vibrant history of The Volunteer State. previous page

Creation Series (detail) by fred rawlinson (1940-

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First Tennessee Heritage Mural: Tennessee Landscape by ted faiers (1908-1985)

published by contemporary media, inc.

150 the fi rst

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by micha el finger | foreword by d. brya n jorda n

Foreword

by D. Bryan Jordan The Heart of Our Story.

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Emerging from Adversity

The New Century

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Remember the Alamo!

ron Terry did. in fact, that’s what inspired the First Tennessee Bank chairman to build the First Tennessee Heritage Collection.

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The First 150: The First Tennessee Story isbn 978-0-615-94990-1

First National Bank persevered during a dark period when Memphis was no longer a city.

As First National Bank expanded its presence in Memphis, it witnessed some of the greatest changes in its history.

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Published by the Creative Content Division of contempor a ry medi a , inc . 460 tennessee street, suite 200 Memphis, tennessee 38103 901-521-9000 Contemporary Media is the publisher of Memphis magazine, Memphis Flyer, MBQ: Inside Memphis Business, Memphis Parent, and other community-oriented and business publications. Copyright ©2014 by First tennessee Bank national Association. All rights reserved. no part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by electronic means without permission in writing from the publisher.

A Bold Venture

A city captured by Union forces during the Civil War might seem an unlikely place to open a new bank, but that didn’t stop Ohio businessman Frank Davis.

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THE F i r S T 150

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Firstpower

Getting Involved

The Next 150

5 6 7 8 9 10 The Modern Era

Developed and refined over the years, a unique corporate culture drives First Tennessee forward.

With a brandnew name, First Tennessee Bank’s growth extended beyond the horizon.

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For First Tennessee, being a good bank goes hand-inhand with being a good neighbor.

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What changes are over the horizon for First Tennessee?

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Changing the Skyline

The Trading Floor

A gleaming new headquarters building set the stage for monumental growth throughout the state — and beyond.

FTN Financial has grown from a one-room bond department into a premier fixedincome firm with an international reputation.

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108 ∂ SOUrCES / ACK NOW L EDGEMEN TS

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The Heart of Our Story

he First Tennessee story is about relationships — enduring relationships with customers, employees, and communities. Without them, no company could survive and thrive for 150 years. By building these relationships, we have grown to span the state of Tennessee, from the Mississippi to the Smokies and beyond. There’s a reason we’re called First Tennessee. Our anniversary book, The First 150, links those relationships to the wider sweep of history since 1864. Founded in Memphis when Abraham Lincoln was president, First Tennessee has endured through the Civil War, yellow fever epidemics, the Great Depression and the Great Recession, two World Wars, and decades of social change. In this book you will find the faces and places, the movers and shakers, the innovation and inspiration that mark our history. Scenes change and actors depart, but the can-do company spirit captured here remains. For us today, it is humbling to be stewards of this legacy, to carry on an endeavor that began in 1864 and continues to affect so many lives and dreams. We are here to celebrate our anniversary because of our resilient culture and the exceptional people who are the real heart of our story, generations of employees serving generations of customers. Whatever changes and challenges the years brought, our people were dedicated to being the best at serving our customers, one opportunity at a time. That’s our promise — yesterday, today, and tomorrow. As you explore the book, keep the title in mind: The First 150. We’re proud of our heritage — but we’re not resting on it. Under the corporate umbrella of First Horizon, First Tennessee and FTN Financial are focused on the future. We are excited about what that will bring as we create products and services our customers will value, make a name for ourselves in new markets like the MidAtlantic region, and earn the title of “Nashville’s bank” in rapidly growing Middle Tennessee. The book tells you how the First Tennessee story began and brings you the latest plot developments, but the last chapter has not been written — and we hope it never will be. Whatever turns our story takes, enduring relationships will remain at the heart of what we do. At First Tennessee, we are ready for our next 150 years.

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o p p o s i t e : Born in North Carolina, Bryan

Jordan earned a B.A. in finance and accounting from Catawba College. He held positions with other financial institutions in this region before joining First Horizon as CFO in 2007. He was named president and CEO in 2008 and elected chairman in 2012.

— D. Bryan Jordan Chairman, President, and CEO of First Horizon National Corporation

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First Tennessee Heritage Mural: Overlooking the Mississippi River by ted faiers (1908-1985) Born in England, Faiers spent much of his life in Canada before coming to Memphis, where he taught at the Memphis Academy of Arts. He passed away before the 51 panels of his “big wall project” could be completed.

“I’m not a native Tennessean, but through this work it has become a more meaningful place for me. I think this is the work people will remember me by.” — ted fa iers

STATE OF ART

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Colonel Crockett, 1839

by c. stuart This engraving of Davy Crockett, the Tennessee frontiersman who died at the Alamo, was the first work of art acquired for the First Tennessee Heritage Collection. o p p o s i t e : Ron Terry, then chairman and CEO of First Tennessee Bank, was inspired to create the Heritage Collection after a visit to the Alamo.

“The sheer human valor enshrined in that dark and tiny place was palpable and stunning, and I remember thinking, ‘I know what it is to be a Tennessean for the first time in my life.’” — ron terry

Remember the Alamo!

ron Terry did. in fact, that’s what inspired the First Tennessee Bank chairman to build the First Tennessee Heritage Collection.

irst tennessee BAnK customers who cash checks and make deposits in Memphis at 165 Madison do so under the steady gaze of elvis Presley, Davy Crockett, and sgt. Alvin York. no, their banking transactions aren’t being monitored by actors, impersonators — or ghosts. instead, these and some two dozen other larger-than-life figures populate the

famous First tennessee heritage Mural installed in the lobby of the bank’s headquarters building downtown. The 110-foot-long work of art — one of the largest displays of public art in Memphis — forms just one component of the bank’s acclaimed First tennessee heritage Collection of paintings and sculptures. not only does the collection celebrate important people, places, and events in tennessee history, but it cements the bank’s ties with the city and state it has now called home for 150 years. THE Fir ST TEN NESSEE STOry

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Working in his tiny home studio, Ted Faiers hand-carved many of the three-dimensional figures in the First Tennessee Heritage Mural.

ennessee became known as the “Volunteer State” when so many of her native sons went off to battle in the War of 1812. Some 30 years later, as Texas fought for independence from Mexico, three dozen Tennesseans — among them the famed frontiersman Davy Crockett — gave their lives at the Battle of the Alamo. The bravery of these men has inspired anyone who has paid a visit to the historic site in San Antonio. Back in the early 1970s, one of those visitors was Memphian Ron Terry. Terry had been named chief executive officer of First Tennessee Bank in 1973. These were dark days for Memphis, still reeling from the shock of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Many downtown businesses were shuttered, few visitors even glanced at the dormant “South’s Grand Hotel,” and the buildings along once-busy Beale Street stood empty and in ruins. “Memphis had moved from becoming a competitor with Atlanta and New Orleans,” said Terry, “to being a competitor with Shreveport and Mobile.” The city,

he remembered, “was in a devastating free-fall. Nothing was going right, and I couldn’t find anything to feel good about.” It was during a business trip to San Antonio that Terry visited the Alamo. “The sheer human valor enshrined in that dark and tiny place was palpable and stunning,” he said, “and I remember thinking, ‘I know what it is to be a Tennessean for the first time in my life.’” Two years later, a visit to the Valley National Bank in Phoenix, Arizona, gave Terry the chance to view an art collection that showcased the history of that region. “The story of Tennessee’s past is every bit as colorful and dramatic as this,” he remembered. “How can we tell it in a way that would give many people the opportunity to feel what I just felt?” When he returned home, his thoughts merged into one single vision: “That First Tennessee build an art collection of, by, and for all the people who have made our state what it is, and our people what they are.” Terry recruited Alice Bingham Gorman, owner of the acclaimed Alice Bingham Gallery in Memphis, to acquire

“The artists didn’t necessarily have to be from Tennessee, but every painting, print, drawing, or sculpture had to have a strong visual relation to the state.” — a lice b. gorma n

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works of art for the new First Tennessee Heritage Collection and serve as the curator. “In the spring of 1979, Ron Terry called and asked me to lunch downtown,” Gorman recalled. “I was starting a new gallery at the time, and I thought we would talk about art for it.” Instead, Terry asked her to visit the Alamo and “just stand there and get a feeling for what the place meant. I left there thinking, ‘I don’t really know what he is talking about, but I’ll give it a try.’” After her own visit to the Alamo, she knew exactly what Terry had been trying to tell her. That was the beginning of a 10-year project. “It was pretty much my choice what went into it, but Ron was very handson with every purchase,” she said. “The artists didn’t necessarily have to be from Tennessee, but every painting, print, drawing, or sculpture had to have a strong visual relation to the state.” Gorman remembered the first piece she obtained — an 1839 color lithograph of Davy Crockett, which she purchased from the Kennedy Gallery in New York City. Other works came

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

from public and private collections, and her own family donated a drawing of Charles McClung, the artist who created the official seal for the state of Tennessee. Some of the pieces were specially commissioned for the bank, such as Memphis sculptor Roy Tamboli’s stunning life-size bronze figure of Olympic sprinter Wilma Rudolph. “In an era of bandwagon corporate art collecting for either decoration or investment purposes,” said Gorman, “this collection stands unique in its pursuit of a visual history of Tennessee through art.” Two years into the project, the growing collection hit the road, traveling to the Tennessee State Museum in Nashville, the Dulin Gallery of Art in Knoxville, and the Hunter Museum of Art in Chattanooga. “People would see the shows,” said Gorman, “and tell me, ‘I’ve got something in my attic that may interest you. We acquired quite a few pieces that way.’” The works in the First Tennnessee Heritage Collection depicted milestones in the state’s history; what came next was something Terry considered a landmark.

Alice Bingham Gorman served for 10 years as the curator of the First Tennessee Heritage Collection, working with artists and galleries from around the country to acquire paintings, prints, and sculptures.

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Phoebe Omlie

by floyd shaman (1935-2005) This lifesize carved-wooden figure depicts the Memphian (1902-1975) who was an aviation pioneer and holder of several world records for flight.

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Wilma Rudolph

by roy tamboli (1951- ) Rudolph, born outside Clarksville (1940-1994), became an international star and an icon of the civil rights movement when she won three gold medals in track and field at the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome.

“Ted Faiers was the perfect artist to do a mural on Tennessee history. He was a modernist and a respected contemporary artist. He worked in a figurative mode, whereas most of the artists in this part of the world dealt more in abstraction. He had a tremendous interest in people and characters. He was the perfect steward for Ron Terry’s vision.” —a lice gorma n 14

lthough the more than 200 individual works of art in the Heritage Collection told individual stories about the state, Terry wanted something that would convey the entire scope of Tennessee in monumental fashion. So began one of the most ambitious art projects ever undertaken in this region: the First Tennessee Heritage Mural, stretching for more than 100 feet along the western wall of the bank’s main lobby at 165 Madison in downtown Memphis. It was Gorman who selected the artist. “Ted Faiers was the perfect artist to do a mural on Tennessee history,” she explained. “He was a modernist and a respected contemporary artist. He worked in a figurative mode, whereas most of the artists in this part of the world dealt more in abstraction. He had a tremendous interest in people and characters.” In short, Gorman said, “He was the perfect steward for Ron Terry’s vision.” He might not have been, to some, the obvious choice. After all, he wasn’t raised in Tennessee — not even close. Born in 1908 in Cornwall, England, Faiers had spent most of his life in Winnipeg, Canada. He moved to Memphis in 1952 to take a position as an instructor with the Memphis Academy of Arts (now Memphis College of Art), where he later became chairman of the painting department and retired in 1977 as professor emeritus. Faiers wholeheartedly embraced the concept of the mural, which he facetiously called “the big wall project,” immersing himself in books on Tennessee and regional history. Within a few months he had developed some 40 small watercolors, showing his conception for the whole mural and the individual panels that would compose it. Gorman recalled that it took Terry just one hour to look over the sketches and approve the overall design. Faiers set to work in the tiny garage studio behind his house on Friar Tuck in East Memphis. Not only were the individual paintings quite large, but Faiers’ creative style was unusual. He had perfected a “low-relief” technique, which involved stretching the canvas over carved wooden forms, and in some cases attaching painted elements to the surfaces of the canvas. The musket, hatchet, and even left leg of Davy Crockett, for example, are painted wooden pieces. Some of the adornments are the

real thing, such as the powder horn that Crockett carries. A Mid-South magazine cover story explained the process: “To the viewer, that means 3-D figures that seem to step right out of the wall. To the artist, it means painstaking research to achieve just the right effects, and arduous hours of wood carving.” Faiers’ wife, Leona, told the reporter that she “was amazed her husband could envision a cohesive 51-panel mural while working in a studio in which he could barely turn around.” The work included larger-than-life images of such iconic figures in Tennessee history as Elvis Presley, Tom Lee, E.H. Crump, and Casey Jones. Other panels featured the Grand Ole Opry, the Civil War, the Tennessee state flag, the state seal, and the Tennessee Valley Authority. All in all, 51 panels would fill a frame 17 feet high by 110 feet long. In a documentary filmed while “the big wall project” was in progress, Faiers explained, “I’m not a native Tennessean, but through this work it has become a more meaningful place for me.” He concluded, “I think this is the work people will remember me by.”

ragedy struck on January 8, 1985, when Ted Faiers died at home of a heart attack at the age of 76. Gorman eulogized him as “one of the few geniuses I have ever known. He had the sensitivity and perception of understanding humanity, and the ability to use that perception visually. He was a man of complete dedication to his art.” Almost a dozen panels in the First Tennessee Heritage Mural were unfinished when Faiers died. The bank pondered various ways to complete the project, such as using only the panels that were completed. Ron Terry emphasized, “Right now we’re not focusing on what is not done, but on what has been done. We’ll decide on an appropriate conclusion to the project as we know Ted would want us to do.” Gorman visited Will Barnet, a New York artist who had been Faiers’ teacher at the Art Students League. Barnet studied the working drawings and the completed panels and suggested that one of Faiers’ students finish the task. “They wouldn’t do exactly what Ted would do,” recalled Gorman, “but they would understand what he’d wanted and would interpret it.”

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Gorman gave Memphis artist Betty Gilow the formidable task of completing the mural. Gilow had been one of Faiers’ most accomplished students and was an instructor at Memphis College of Art and Rhodes College. She set about filling in the gaps in the mural with a selection of Tennessee landscapes. The sheer size of the project was, at first, almost overwhelming. The panels that Gilow worked on were so large they wouldn’t fit in her studio, so she made smaller charcoal sketches and then rescaled them by projecting the images onto the panels, which had been mounted at the end of her driveway. Though the completed mural was a blend of two styles, the result was a success. “In the end it came together beautifully,” said Gorman. “There is such a sympathy between her work and his. The rhythms flow easily from them. Her color is not quite as strong as Ted’s, which is fine because in a sense her paintings form a kind of framework around his.” The completed mural was finally unveiled in September 1987. Rick Gruber, director of Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, proclaimed it “one of the most ambitious art commissions ever undertaken in the state.” A Commercial Appeal reviewer conveyed his feelings more dramatically: “In live-volcano fashion, it is a mural that appears to have taken all the pent-up turbulence of the state’s 191 years and arrived at a cataclysmic 3-D blowout spewing everything from Indians to Elvis Presley.” Gorman worked 10 years as curator of the First Tennessee Heritage Collection. “I don’t remember the budget that was given me for it, but it was very generous and there was nothing that Ron wouldn’t consider for it,” she said. “It’s been one of the great joys of my life working with him on that collection.”

he First Tennessee Heritage Mural still greets visitors today in the main lobby of First Tennessee’s downtown Memphis corporate headquarters building, as bright and stunning as if it were painted yesterday. “The mural is a landmark,” said Ron Terry, “a monumental one whose sweep and power tell us that it is possible in one time and one place to see the grandeur of a birthright and to feel a spirit of unity with it.” More than 60 works from the First Tennessee Heritage Collection are also on view in the lobby gallery, with other pieces on display in company locations across Tennessee. Selected works from the collection are presented throughout these pages. Just as this book salutes the 150-year history of First Tennessee Bank, so these works celebrate the long and vibrant history of The Volunteer State. •

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p r e v i o u s p a g e s : A Harper’s Weekly

illustration shows the Memphis riverfront from the mid-nineteenth century.

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Andy’s Jacket

by mary sims (1940-2004) Born in Memphis (her father was well-known Commercial Appeal columnist Lydel Sims), Mary Sims blended an eye for detail with whimsical elements, such as the bouquet of bright flowers tucked into the collar of the jacket of Andrew Jackson. Her paintings are in public galleries and the private collections of Burt Reynolds, Mary Tyler Moore, and John Grisham.

“Memphis must necessarily become a flourishing and populous town. It occupies a position which is always perfectly accessible to steamboats, and to vessels of every kind and description. There is no situation on the banks of the Mississippi … better suited to the rapid Early Memphisof as depicted by Harper's Weekly. acquisition wealth.” — john overton 18

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A Bold Venture

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A city captured by Union forces during the Civil War might seem an unlikely place to open a new bank, but that didn’t stop Ohio businessman Frank Davis.

n the early 1800s, Memphis was the kind of place where a mule

drowned in a mud puddle on Main Street. No doubt the wealthy land speculators from Nashville — General James

Winchester, Judge John Overton, and General (and future president) Andrew Jackson who founded the town in 1819 — had high hopes for their new venture. They gave it the rather exotic name of Memphis, after the ancient capital

of Egypt, and laid out 362 lots on the Fourth Chickasaw Bluff overlooking the Mississippi River, providing for a public promenade along the river and four public parks. In his original advertisement to would-be property owners, Overton extolled the virtues

of the new town, noting that “Memphis must necessarily become a flourishing and populous town. It occupies a position which is always perfectly accessible to steamboats, and to vessels of every kind and description.” Although the town began with a population of only 50,

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

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Andrew Jackson portrait

by jon r. johnston (1820-1872) after g. p. a. healy. Although he is considered one of the founders of Memphis, most historians believe the seventh president of the United States (1767-1845) never visited the property he purchased. “Old Hickory” sold his share in the development to a Nashville businessman, John C. McLemore.

Future site of First National Bank

o p p o s i t e : The original plan for Memphis. i N s e t: The Cotton Exchange, one of the

town’s largest structures, replaced a smaller, more humble building. l e f t: As depicted in Harper’s Weekly, the Gayoso House deserved its status as the city’s fi rst grand hotel.

including “several families of the first respectability,” Overton was confident that “there is no situation on the banks of the Mississippi which is more auspicious to health, or better suited to the rapid acquisition of wealth.” The future would prove him right, of course, but it took decades before Memphis would truly become a town, much less a city. historian John harkins, author of Metropolis of the American Nile, called the place “primitive and pestilential.” After all, except for the river location, in those early days why would anyone want to live here? The city that would one day be acclaimed “America’s Distribution Center” due to its centralized location was considered a western outpost, on the edge of the frontier. in 1819, only one state was established west of the Mississippi river — Louisiana. Maps labeled most of the vast area between the new town and the Pacific Ocean as “new spain” or the “Missouri territory.” so it’s no surprise that in the early days the Bluff City didn’t enjoy the civilized amenities of older, more established cities along the eastern seaboard. here, the river and shallow backyard wells provided the only sources of filthy drinking water,

THE Fir ST TEN NESSEE STOry

and the town had no sewers or sanitation system, no gasworks, no paved streets, and of course in those days no electricity. The few buildings built by the first settlers were little more than wooden shacks, and trash — anything from broken crockery to rotten food and rubbish — was dumped over the edge of the bluff into the river. The city may have been called “A Place of Good Abode,” but a visitor from today would have been stunned by the sounds, smells, and even the darkness of early Memphis. There was no rumble of cars or trucks, or the roar of trains or planes. The main sound on the streets was the clip-clop of hooves, or the tread of boots along the wooden sidewalks. in the days before streetcars, everything was delivered by horses or mules pulling carts, and people who had the means traveled by horse or carriage; the rest just walked from their homes to wherever they worked. Without a decent sanitation system, the citizens of Memphis had to be careful just where they walked. Chamber pots were often emptied directly onto the street, along with the inevitable piles of manure, and when it rained, the roads were as mucky and slippery as the banks of Ole Man river. After dark, the city’s only

The Bluff City didn’t enjoy the civilized amenities of older, more established cities. The river and shallow backyard wells provided the only source of filthy drinking water, and the town had no sewers or sanitation system, no gasworks, no paved streets, and of course in those days no electricity.

r i g h t: The 1862 Battle of Memphis, as depicted in Harper’s Weekly.

The first bank opened in Memphis in 1834, its name, the Farmers and Merchants Bank, accurately describing its customers. It would be decades before most private citizens had their own bank accounts.

light came from the dim glow of kerosene lanterns or candles. except for the taverns, most stores and other businesses closed at dusk for the simple reason that it was impossible to work very well in the dim light cast by candles.

nd yet slowly the population began to grow. By 1830, it had reached 1,000, and sure enough, all the original plots quickly sold and the city expanded well beyond its original boundaries. The town had elected its first mayor, Marcus Winchester, the son of one of the founders, and he also served as

Memphis’ first postmaster. taverns and trading posts opened, serving the families who moved here and others in the surrounding counties. shops and businesses lined the streets, among them cobblers, tinsmiths, brickyards, tailors, lumberyards, and cotton warehouses. The first bank opened in Memphis in 1834, its name, Farmers and Merchants Bank, accurately describing its customers. it would be decades before most private citizens had their own bank accounts, for the simple reason that very few people actually carried money. Because of its bulk, coins were almost unheard of. Most business was conducted by trading, or by using currency in the form of paper money that was printed

T HE F ir ST 150

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First Tennessee Heritage Mural: Civil War

by ted faiers (1908-1985) Although the North defeated the South in the war that divided the nation, instead of depicting the victory or defeat of either side, Faiers’ mural panel focused on the personal confrontations of many of the battles.

Although Memphis wasn’t burned to the ground like Atlanta and didn’t suffer the deprivations of Vicksburg or New Orleans, it was still considered an “enemy” city under martial law for the duration of the war. Many business leaders fled the city; even the town’s newspaper loaded its presses onto boxcars and escaped to Mississippi. 23

above

First Tennessee Heritage Mural: James Robertson

by ted faiers (1908-1985) The panel of the explorer and pioneer (1742-1814) is a good example of Faiers’ three-dimensional technique. Robertson’s rifle and cane are separate, carved wooden pieces. The powder horn is real.

by the individual states. To make change — say, a half dollar, one simply tore a dollar bill in half. The city opened its first insurance company, covering “the cargo of steamboats, keelboats, flatboats, and other river crafts against fire and the risks of the river,” and other small businesses such as saloons, blacksmiths, tailors, barbers, and cobblers began to thrive. A grand hotel, the 250-room Gayoso House, went up on Front Street. “If Memphis made laggardly progress over the first two decades of its existence,” wrote Harkins, “the city seemed determined to make up for lost time during its second score of years.” And of course, Memphis began to take advantage of its strategic location on the river that formed the city’s border on the west, serving as a port for the growing number of riverboats that linked the new town to places north and south. Plank roads, so named because they were literally paved with wooden boards, reached north, south, and east and made traveling by horse and stagecoach to adjacent communities smoother and faster. That fledgling transportation network expanded much farther in 1846, when the Memphis and Charleston Railroad linked the city to the Atlantic Ocean. Much of that river and railroad trade centered on cotton. “Beginning with a scant 300 bales of the white fiber in 1825, the cotton trade passed 35,000 bales in 1840, when Memphis replaced Randolph (Tennessee) as the principal steamboat landing on the mid-Mississippi,” wrote Harkins. “By 1850, Memphis was the largest inland cotton market in the world.” Almost every business along Front Street was devoted to cotton trading, buying, and grading. Cotton traders built grand mansions on the outskirts of town, several of them still standing in today’s Victorian Village. Illustrations and the occasional photograph from this period show thousands of cotton bales stacked on the cobblestones and steamboats loaded to the waterline with “white gold.” Business was booming, and the population almost tripled between 1850 and 1860. Harkins noted, “During the 1850s, Memphis grew at a faster rate than any other city in the nation. From fewer than 1,800 people in 1840, it exploded to more than 22,000 in 1858.” The city’s boundaries now embraced almost six square miles, and with financial support from the state legislature, Memphis had begun to build schools, extend railroad lines, improve the cobblestone waterfront, and even pave some of its streets. Though we don’t know the exact date, it was during this time that a Cincinnati businessman named Frank Davis paid the first of several visits to the Bluff City. History is vague about

his initial impressions of the thriving community, but he would return some 10 years later and make a tremendous impact on the new city.

nd then the war came. Tennessee was the last state to secede from the Union, and after a hard-fought victory at Bull Run in 1861, the Confederate forces were sure the war would be brief. The tide quickly changed, however, because the sheer numbers of the Southern forces couldn’t compete with the industrial might of the North, which could supply the Union armies with a seemingly unlimited supply of ships, weapons, and ammunition. That advantage became painfully obvious during the Battle of Memphis on the morning of June 6, 1862, when the Confederate forces in their converted wooden riverboats met the new ironclads of the Union fleet. The battle lasted just 90 minutes, and it was considered such an entertaining affair that Memphians gathered in carriages along the riverbluff to watch the show. They probably didn’t like what they saw. In less than two hours seven of the eight Confederate gunboats were sunk or destroyed, and Memphis fell into Union hands. Although the city wasn’t burned to the ground like Atlanta and didn’t suffer the deprivations of Vicksburg or New Orleans, it was still an “enemy” city under martial law for the duration of the war. Many business leaders fled the city; even the town’s newspaper, the Memphis Appeal, loaded its presses onto a boxcar and escaped to Mississippi, always staying just ahead of the Union forces, it seems, and continuing to publish until the war ended. Many businesses here closed, and those that remained open had to make do with dwindling supplies. “In contrast to the feverish activity of the previous autumn,” wrote Gerald Capers in The Biography of a River Town, “trade was now dull and confined chiefly to traffic in sugar and molasses. Prices were soaring, luxuries had disappeared, and the shortage of necessaries was becoming serious. Prices were dictated by a provost marshal, and days passed without the receipt of a pound of freight.” An article from the newspaper described conditions in the wartime city in 1864: “The sun of the ill-fated Southern Confederacy is beginning to set as the full meaning of the ragged rebel army’s crushing defeat at Gettysburg, only a few months before, is realized. Abraham Lincoln is president of the United States. For two years, Memphis has been a conquered city, controlled by federal officers and patrolled by federal troops. Main Street is merely a

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Frank Davis, founder of First National Bank.

streak of mud between rows of low buildings, most of which are illuminated at night by oil lamps. The town, numbering perhaps 25,000 inhabitants, extends only as far east as Dunlap.” Published many years later, a Commercial Appeal newspaper article provided an even bleaker picture: “The city had been ripped to shreds by war, its population cut in half in three years. Food and the necessities of life were scarce and available only at prohibitive prices. Trade was at a standstill, business demoralized. Firms were closing out and moving elsewhere. Building activity had halted. Citizens, crippled by the years of fighting, were heartsick and discouraged.”

It may seem strange that Frank Davis would open a federal bank in a city whose men and women didn’t consider themselves United States citizens. But Davis had the sense to realize that, after the war, this would be the most stable and secure bank for them.

n t o t h i s c h ao t ic s c en e c a m e F r a n k Dav i s , the businessman from Cincinnati. Although the Commercial Appeal had observed, “Memphis could hardly be called an inviting background for a new business venture,” Davis had other ideas. He had seen firsthand the opening of several banks in his Ohio hometown and — sensing that the war would end soon — was determined to open a new bank here. But not a local or state bank. Memphis already had plenty of those, and most of them were struggling to survive. Davis had the vision to see a need for a national bank, chartered by the federal government. He wrote back to his wife, “I like Memphis one hundred per cent … the businessmen are very cordial, the weather is pleasant, and the hotel quite good. I have seen the Treasurer’s agent here who is very kind, and who said he should certainly deposit with us. Many others say the same, so we can’t help doing well.” To modern readers, it may seem strange that Davis would plan to open a federal bank in a city whose men and women didn’t consider themselves United States citizens, despite the federal occupation. But Davis had the sense to realize that, after the war, this would be the most stable and secure bank for them. And looking back at the situation that existed here in 1864, Fleming Saunders, a spokesman for the U.S. Comptroller of the Currency, noted that most state banks “had been overwhelmed by the Civil War.” He continued, “During 1863 and 1864, 168 of 221 Southern banks [permanently] closed, compared to 35 of 1,324 non-Southern banks. A bank almanac listed 40 Tennessee state banks (including branches) for both February 1863 and February 1864.” Only five of those banks were still in business just a year later. Summing up Davis’ intention to open the first “national” bank in Memphis, Saunders said, “Support for national banks came from various rural and Western regions suffering from unreliable, depreciated currencies and ‘wildcat’ banking — that is,

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

where state banks made a mess of things.” The National Banking Acts of 1863 and 1864 had established a framework for a system of national banks and had authorized the U.S. Treasury Department to examine and regulate them to prevent just such a “mess of things.” Davis met with a local attorney in his law firm above a shop on Second Street. The bank’s archives have preserved the minutes from that very first meeting of the First National Bank: “March 10, 1864: A meeting of those persons favorable to the organization of a bank under the National Banking Law having been called at the office of Charles Brady Brown, attorney-at-law. Mr. Lewis Howe was chosen chairman and Mr. I.C. Elston, secretary. … Articles of association were formulated …” Other businessmen present included William H. Brooks, William A. Gwyn, Robert McGregor, John G. Wallace, and S.H. De BeVoise, all of them either cotton factors or wholesale grocers.

r i g h t: The bank’s 1864 charter issued by the U. S. Department of the Treasury. o p p o s i t e : Cotton bales cover the cobblestones in this busy riverfront scene from Harper’s Weekly.

According to old newspaper articles, a capital structure of $100,000 — an enormous sum in those days — was drafted and all men in attendance were named directors. Davis himself was elected the first president of the First National Bank and Elston was named the first cashier. The name wasn’t official yet. That came with the bank’s charter, issued by the U.S. Department of the Treasury and dated March 25, 1864.

“We expect tomorrow to begin business — that is, commence looking for a banking room and for stockholders.” — fr a nk davis The charter, number 336 issued by the federal government, officially made the name of First National Bank literally true: It was not only the first “national” bank in Memphis, but one of the first in the entire South. Now the real work had to begin. Davis wrote to his wife, “We expect tomorrow to begin business — that is, commence looking for a banking room and for stockholders.” •

right

On a Mississippi Riverboat

by Dean Cornwell (1892-1960) Born in Louisville, Kentucky, Cornwell contributed so many illustrations to American magazines that he became known as the “Dean of Illustrators.” He was also a talented muralist, painting scenes in the Davidson County Courthouse and the Sevier State Office Building in Nashville.

Ro etur, tendero molorporum licia quod quatur, velibus eligni teni asit eostor ad moluptatium volorpo rporeces dicia veratio nsequia sunt asse re, voles volorae dolorectus, cum reperfe rferis solorem. Ut volore volorae cullit ulparum ut reperum deliti bea sum que simpediciis” — john doe 28

864-1899

r i g h t: A Harper’s Weekly rendering of

Madison Avenue in Memphis, with the First National Bank building on the right (with the yellow awning). o p p o s i t e : An early image of the First National Bank building on Madison Avenue.

First National Bank began operations on Madison, a street where it would continue to do business for the next 150 years. Perhaps the directors sensed the enduring success of their new firm when, just one year after it opened, the bank doubled its capital to $200,000. 30

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Emerging from Adversity First National Bank persevered during a dark period when Memphis was no longer a city.

ith their new charter in hand, the directors of First National Bank were eager to commence business in Memphis. One challenge was finding a building for their establishment. Practically every location in the down-

town area was filled to capacity, but after weeks of eager searching, they came upon a two-story structure at 9 Madison Avenue, an old brick building formerly occupied by the Union Bank of Memphis, and arranged a lease of $75 a month.

The building wasn’t empty, but bank records indicate that Frank Davis paid the occupant a bonus of $1,500 to vacate the premises. It was a prime location,

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

3 ∂

During the 1878 yellow fever epidemic, an editorial encouraged readers, “Keep cool! Avoid patent medicines and bad whiskey. Go about your business as usual. Be cheerful and laugh as much as possible.” 32

in the heart of the business district, between Main Street and Second Street. The new bank’s neighbors included the Bank of Memphis, the Jackson Insurance Company, and the Nashville and Memphis Telegraph Company. Even so, the 30-year-old building needed a great deal of work to make it more presentable and functional as a bank. The renovations began immediately, but the directors weren’t willing to wait. They rented a large room above the Adams Express Company on North Court Street, bordering Court Square. Though the exact date of the opening is vague, a bank history noted the important occasion: “And here, early in April 1864, the First National Bank of Memphis swung open its doors — or perhaps ‘door’ would be a better word, since it had but a single entrance from a dimly lighted corridor.” The renovations to the Madison Avenue building were completed within months, and First National Bank began operations on Madison — a street where it would continue to do business for the next 150 years. Perhaps the directors sensed the enduring success of their new firm when, just one year after it opened, the bank doubled its capital — to $200,000 — and with growing numbers of customers and accounts, Davis and the board of directors decided they needed more space. So for $37,000 they purchased a larger, more impressive building just a few doors east, at 14 Madison. Vintage photographs show an impressive two-story brick building, its entrance flanked by four broad pilasters, and windows shaded by brightly striped awnings. Newspaper accounts claim the building was made of bricks that were made in Philadelphia and brought to Memphis by boat. Across the pediment, carved in stone were the words FIRST NATIONAL BANK. “The pride felt by the bank’s Officers and Directors in ownership of this building would probably bring a smile to the faces of those who are familiar with First National’s banking room of today.” That’s according to a bank history, which described the early building’s three fireplaces for heat, rows of oil lamps for light, and a pail of water kept in the lobby for thirsty customers. “Lacking our present-day impregnable vaults, the bank was forced to keep its cash in an old-fashioned box-like safe, which was opened by an enormous iron key. This safe, impressive in those days, would have offered slight resistance to modern burglary tools of today.” That safe, perhaps small by today’s standards, held as much as $2 million in 1865 — much of it in gold. As a federally chartered bank, First National was given the responsibility of handling the payroll of the Union troops stationed within Memphis and just

outside the city limits in the sprawling Fort Pickering complex. The bank prospered, and the years following the Civil War saw unprecedented growth in Memphis. Former residents returned to their hometown, and businessmen from other cities flocked to the city. “Many of the Northerners whom war had attracted to Memphis chose to remain as citizens upon the cessation of hostilities,” wrote Gerald Capers in Biography of a River Town. “This new blood was stimulating, and those who returned home advertised the city’s commercial advantages in the world above the Mason and Dixon line. Intangible though such publicity was, it proved no mean asset when Northern capital and Northern firms began to turn their gaze southward.” That “primitive and pestilential” mudhole of the early 1800s was quickly transforming itself into a much more civilized community, and Memphis was on its way to becoming one of the fastest growing cities in the country, its population of 45,000 outpacing that of Nashville, Birmingham, and even Atlanta.

ut then came destruction and desolation much worse than anything Memphis had endured during the Civil War. In the summer of 1878, death swarmed into Memphis on tiny wings. Carried by a tiny mosquito — the species Aedes Aegypti carried an Egyptian name, much like the city it destroyed — it brought the dreaded yellow fever into taverns and shops, bedrooms and parlors. No one was safe, because no one even knew the cause of the disease, and there was no cure. Various “experts” proposed bizarre ways to prevent the disease. A St. Louis physician announced the fever was “present in the form of dry particles of dust.” A Texas doctor concluded that the disease “is a subtle poison that explodes in the air.” Even the city’s own Appeal carried an editorial that encouraged readers, “Keep cool! Avoid patent medicines and bad whiskey. Go about your business as usual. Be cheerful and laugh as much as possible.” Southern cities had encountered yellow fever before. An earlier epidemic in 1873 killed some 2,000 people in Memphis. But it was nothing like the great epidemic of 1878, which one doctor observed “struck Memphis with unusual malignity and unusual rapidity.” Within 10 days of the first confirmed death, more than half the population of Memphis fled the city in a panic. As James M. Keating wrote in his 1888 History of Memphis, they escaped “by every possible conveyance — by hacks, carriages, buggies, wagons, furniture vans, and street drays. By anything that could

the f i r st 1 5 0

float on the river, and by the railroads.” Another Memphis newspaper, the curiously named Daily Avalanche, reported grimly, “We are doomed. The King of Terrors continues to snatch victims with fearful rapidity. Three short weeks ago our city was active with business of all classes. Now our streets are deserted, our stores and residences empty.” Not all stores. During this bleak period in our city’s history, First National Bank remained open. The bank not only transacted business for the few thousand citizens who remained behind in Memphis, but it handled relief funds sent here from people in other cities. Much of that money went to the Howard Association, a group of volunteers who went door to door in the stricken city, bringing food and medicine to suffering families — many of them losing their lives as they did so. One man has gained everlasting fame in First National Bank’s history for his bravery during the epidemic. Most of the bank’s officials left the city with their families, but two bank employees, cashier W.W. Thatcher and bookkeeper Charles Q. Harris, remained behind to run the bank, though it opened for only three hours each day. Within a few days, Thatcher was stricken with the fever, and Harris worked alone to manage the bank during the epidemic. Although it was deemed dangerous to venture outside, newspaper accounts report that Harris regularly visited the shipping offices in Court Square to collect cash — one time as much as $75,000 — sent here for the relief organizations. That same newspaper which had earlier urged citizens to “be cheerful” now warned everyone to stay away from the stricken city: “We know that our businessmen are impatient to get home and renew business. We say to them there is no business being transacted here. … Memphis is now dealing in death, and not in the goods which go to make up the business of the commercial season.” If any readers were still not convinced, the newspaper concluded, “Those who come from a healthy clime to our fever-scorched city can only be termed deluded victims of the beckonings of an invisible but murderous monster.” This was the situation that Charles Q. Harris

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

OPPOSITE PAGE A N D ABOVE

First Tennessee Heritage Mural Sketch and Finished Panel: Anonymous Nun by ted faiers (1908-1985) In Memphis, nuns with St. Mary’s Episcopal Cathedral treated yellow fever victims; four of them, along with two priests, died trying to help the citizens of the stricken city. l e f t: Charles Q. Harris, bank hero.

found himself in as the months crept by. All anyone knew about yellow fever was that cold weather brought an end to it — never dreaming that the cold killed the mosquitoes carrying the virus. But eventually a cold spell did come, in late October, and yellow fever was gone. For his bravery during these difficult times, it is reported that harris was given a substantial bonus when the bank resumed normal business, and when he retired in 1918, he was given the title of honorary Vice President. (Admiration for his loyalty lives on. today, the bank annually honors its top leader with the Charles Q. harris Leadership Award.)

a b o v e : Artesian wells fi nally provided

Memphis with clean drinking water. r i g h t: Court Square in the 1800s. o p p o s i t e : The Great Memphis Bridge, the

longest bridge in North America when it was completed in 1892, linked the growing city with the West.

ellow fever left behind a ghost town. some citizens returned, but many thousands — especially the city’s German and italian families — decided to stay away for good. With its population so dramatically reduced, city leaders took the drastic step of surrendering the city’s charter. From 1879 until 1891, Memphis was no more; in its place was the shelby County taxing District, governed by a committee of fire and police commissioners. ironically, some of the former city’s greatest public improvements took place during this period when, technically, the city didn’t even exist. One historian observed, “The citizens, strengthened and sobered by the ordeal through which they had passed, courageously set about the task of restoring the city’s growth and activity. During years of war, oppression, panic, and pestilence — an era of tragedy unparalleled in the history of any American city — their unbounded optimism and faith in the future remained unshaken.” A horse-drawn streetcar system was put in place and later exchanged for newfangled electric trolleys that glided on rails. Parks and boulevards were laid out, a Grand Opera house opened on Main street, schools and colleges were constructed, and the first Peabody hotel opened. The Great Memphis Bridge (later known as the Frisco Bridge) spanned the Mississippi river as the longest bridge in north America, finally linking Memphis by railroad to the West. Although no one had yet connected the deadly mosquitoes with all the mud puddles and open wells scattered throughout town, sewer lines were laid, and better sanitation systems were

put in place. The most important improvement of all came about by accident, when an ice company drilling a deep well punched into the water-bearing sands hundreds of feet below the bluff, supplying an endless supply of clear, clean drinking water. even the skyline changed, as the early town’s low buildings were replaced with rows of handsome brick structures. the Continental Bank erected an 11-story building overlooking Court square that is considered Memphis’ first skyscraper; known today as the D.t. Porter Building, it was such an architectural marvel that visitors paid a dime to ride elevators to the roof, where they enjoyed a birds-eye view of the growing town. And on the riverfront, the new U.s. Customs house, with its twin clock towers, and the red sandstone castle that housed the Cossitt Library, the city’s first library, offered a grand impression to anyone reaching the Bluff City by riverboat. The city’s charter was finally restored in 1891, and though there were other smaller yellow fever epidemics and financial crises that caused problems in other parts of the country — the Panic of 1893 for one — Memphis seemed barely affected by them. A newspaper article observed, “The great national currency panic was hardly felt in Memphis. Many banks in other cities were forced to pay their customers in clearinghouse scrip, but Memphis bankers honored all checks and drafts with currency.” Commenting several years later on this phase of the city’s history, the Memphis Evening Scimitar noted, “The confidence in the ability of our banks to meet any emergency has been as deep-rooted in the public mind as the public trust in the integrity of bankers. This is a record of which Memphis financiers are justly proud, and the glory of it is shared by the whole population.” in 1882, Frank Davis, who had returned to Memphis after the yellow fever epidemic subsided, retired as president of First national Bank. even then, he continued to contribute to the growth of the city by becoming president of the newly formed Memphis street railway system. When he passed away in 1890, a local newspaper observed, “his ability as a financier and his upright and honorable business principles soon won him popularity and friends. he loved his business for itself, and in the pride that he took in his profession he scorned to lower it by doing a mean or unworthy action.” •

T HE F ir ST 150

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

below

Marker on the Mississippi

by carroll cloar (1913-1993) One of the South’s best-known painters, Cloar transformed childhood memories into unique and often surreal views. Born in Earle, Arkansas, he maintained a home and studio in Memphis. Cloar once said he was trying to depict “the last of old America.”

right

Birth of the Blues

by dewitt jordan (1932-1977) Jordan was an African-American artist with a wide following, especially known for his murals that depicted the vibrant and colorful life of the American South. Several of his most popular works are now part of the First Tennessee Heritage Collection.

900-1964

p r e v i o u s p a g e s : An undated

photograph of the First National Bank basketball team. r i g h t: First National Bank’s main building on Second Street in downtown Memphis in the 1920s. b e l o w : The leather spine from a bank ledger book from the late 1800s. b o t t o M ( l e f t- r i g h t ) : Bank presidents C.W. Schulte, James Omberg, and Samuel Ragland. o p p o s i t e p a g e : Mr. & Mrs. Norfleet Turner address employees at a company meeting.

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The New Century As First National Bank expanded its presence in Memphis, it witnessed some of the greatest changes in its history.

s the nineteenth century drew to a close, other men followed Frank Davis as president of First national Bank: n.M. Jones (1882-1894) and C.W. schulte (1894-1907). schulte oversaw the acquisition of the German Bank, which increased First national’s deposits from $700,000 to $1.1 million.

it was during the tenure of the next president, James Omberg, however, that the

bank witnessed truly significant expansion. Born in Georgia, Omberg had come to Memphis shortly after the Civil War and obtained a job as a clerk with Farmers and Merchants Bank. he later took increasingly important positions with the Union & Planters Bank, the Bank of Commerce, and the Bank of Commerce and trust. Described by reporters as “one of the last of those sterling characters,” he was offered the position of president of First national Bank in 1907.

THE Fir ST TEN NESSEE STOry

4 ∂

a b o v e : The bank’s main lobby in 1939. r i g h t: First National’s “motorbranch.”

Bank officials later revealed that if branch banking hadn’t caught on, the new building was designed for easy conversion into a Piggly Wiggly grocery.

Almost immediately Omberg determined that the bank needed better facilities, so the old building was razed and a new structure was erected on the site. While the new headquarters was under construction, First National operated out of rented quarters in a vacant building at Main and Monroe — one of the few times in its history that it didn’t do business on Madison, which had become known as “Banker’s Row.” The new twostory building was a striking Greek Revival edifice, with an imposing entrance and four fluted stone columns supporting a massive pediment. Described as “modern in every detail,” the building featured an ornate interior, glistening floor to ceiling with imported marble. First National Bank’s role in the national banking system was about to become even more crucial. In 1913 Congress passed the Federal Reserve Act, authorizing the establishment of a Federal Reserve Bank in each of 12 geographic districts of the United

States. First National became one of just five banks — and the only one in Memphis at the time — to participate in the Federal Reserve system. Omberg retired in 1919 and passed away the following year. He was laid to rest in Elmwood Cemetery. The Commercial Appeal, paying tribute to his 60 years in the banking business, noted that “he had contributed much to the financial growth of a great community” and “no greater outpouring of citizens to pay honor to the memory of any man in private life has occurred in Memphis.” The next president of the bank was Presley S. Smithwick, who started his business career as a bookkeeper in a hardware store. He guided the acquisition of an older Memphis bank, Central State National, that would give First National yet another new, and larger, home downtown. Central State had been organized in the late 1800s and had prospered to the point where it was able to erect an 18-story skyscraper — the tallest building on Banker’s Row. The quite beautiful red brick tower was capped with terra-cotta ornamentation on the top floors and featured rows of arched windows faced with white stone at the street level — a very handsome and substantial building (and still standing today, converted into apartments). In 1926 the older bank merged with First National, which acquired the larger building and retained the First National name. The Memphis Press-Scimitar reminisced, “Its daily clearances were once listed with a lead pencil on a single sheet of paper. Now a million dollars a day passes through its books.” Admiring the bank’s new headquarters, The Commercial Appeal wrote, “This modern bank and office building is a fitting monument to the progress of one of the most stable financial institutions in the South.” Along with the merger came a change in leadership. Smithwick became chairman of the board of First National, and Samuel E. Ragland, the former president of Central State, was named president of First National. Just as it seemed when the bank first opened in 1864, once again it seems First National had taken a large step at just the wrong time. Just three years after the merger, the stock market crashed and the country sank into the Great Depression. Across America, factories were shuttered and farmers were driven to ruin by relentless drought. But as in the past, Memphis managed to escape the full brunt of these economic forces. A bank history noted, “Despite the unstable economic conditions prevailing after 1929, First National showed a remarkable growth record; its deposits tripled during the 13-year period between 1926 and 1939, and total resources climbed from $19 million to more than $46 million.” Indeed, the 1930s were something of a golden age for Memphis.

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The city added more than 500 manufacturing facilities to its list of industries. Memphis factories produced or refined rubber, tires, paper, lumber, cotton, furniture, chemicals, and textiles. Most streets were now paved, the city was served by more than a dozen railroads, and a new municipal airport opened up the skies for the transport of passengers and freight.

n 1939, First National Bank celebrated its 75th anniversary in Memphis. Thousands of customers were treated to an open house of the bank’s building and enjoyed a special exhibit, on loan from New York City’s Chase Manhattan Bank, on unusual money from foreign lands — including such oddities as a carved whale’s tooth used as currency in the Fiji Islands. For its entire history, First National had focused its attention on downtown. In 1941 it embarked on yet another bold venture — a branch bank in the Memphis suburbs. Today, it’s amusing to think that a bank at Union and Cleveland would be considered “suburban,” but bank histories record that “there were some misgivings as to the ability of the branch to succeed in a location so far removed from the downtown business district.” Bank president Ragland sought to reassure everyone about the new venture. “Contrary to what seems to be a widespread opinion, we are not going into the branch banking business,” he told reporters. “That’s not the idea at all.” At the same time, he explained that the Crosstown branch would conduct the same kinds of business as the main office downtown, with added emphasis on personal loans and automobile financing. Newspapers gushed about the understated design of the one-story building, surrounded by a lawn and low hedges, with a tall flagpole at one corner. The bank was “buff brick, and the entrance bordered with albarene, a marble-like material. Inside, a distinctive note is added to the high-paneled ceilings, modernistic air-conditioning grills, and concealed fluorescent lights. The lower walls are paneled in light French walnut.” On opening day, every teller wore a red carnation. The Crosstown branch’s first customer was John Pappas, owner of the One Minute Lunch Room on Madison, who waited in line “with a fistful of bills” to deposit and told reporters, “I expect to do all my banking here from now on.” The Crosstown branch has served thousands of customers for more than 70 years now, but bank officials revealed later that if the “branch banking” concept hadn’t caught on, the building had been specially designed for easy conversion into a Piggly Wiggly grocery store.

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

L e g a c y

o f

L e a d e r s h i p

Norfleet Turner

hen Norfleet Turner passed away in 1989 at the age of 87, The Commercial Appeal observed that he was “one of the most widely known bankers in the South.” A native Memphian, Turner graduated from Central High School and attended Gulf Coast Military Academy and Washington and Lee University. He began his banking career in the 1920s in Memphis as a clerk at Union Planters, and a few years later took a management position with First Securities Corporation, a municipal bond brokerage. When that firm was acquired by First National Bank, he joined the bank’s bond division, becoming bank vice president in 1933 and president in 1943. He named Allen Morgan Sr. as his successor in 1960 and remained at First National as chairman of the board until 1967, when he resigned to begin a phase of his career he described as “coming and going as I please.” During his almost three decades of leadership, he saw First National grow from a bank with $24 million in assets to more than $660 million. In his spare time he was devoted to numerous civic causes, among them membership on the boards of the United States Chamber of Commerce, Baptist Memorial Hospital, the Crippled Adults Hospital, Memphis Rotary Club, Southwestern at Memphis (now Rhodes College), and Berea College in Kentucky. For years he served as president of the Community Chest, the forerunner of today’s United Way. His numerous honors included the Brotherhood Award from the National Conference of Christians and Jews, the Outstanding Community Salesman Award from the Memphis Sales Executive Club, and an Achievement Citation from Who’s Who in the South and Southwest. Former colleagues remembered Turner as a man who ran a tight ship, sending memos to employees if he felt they had too much clutter on their desks and insisting that all bank officers wear hats to work. “I think he single-handedly kept the hat stores downtown in business,” said George Lewis, who worked with Turner in the bond department. Other employees remember an unusual quirk for a bank president: Norfleet Turner, it seems, couldn’t stand the color green. He played a major role in the development of First National over a 30-year period. “He was one of the finest bankers I ever knew,” Mark Vorder Bruegge, vice chairman of United American Bank, told The Commercial Appeal. In that same article, Dave Cooley, president of the Memphis Area Chamber of Commerce, remembered him as “a stately sort of man, with a quiet sense of humor. He was always in the thick of things, wanting to help the community prosper.” •

n 1943 Ragland stepped down as president of First National Bank, and executive vice president Norfleet Turner was named the bank’s seventh president. Ragland, who was appointed chairman of the board, told reporters the reason for this important transition: “During the past three years I have been away from the bank much of the time, attending meetings of the Federal Advisory Council. During my absence from the bank, Mr. Turner has performed the duties of president as well as his own. He is well-equipped for his new responsibilities, and I know he will do a good job. He is young, just a few years older than I was when I took the same job exactly 29 years ago. He can take a lot of hours and work from my shoulders, and I can get to work a little later in the morning and take off a little earlier in the afternoon.” Ragland reassured everyone, “But if any of my friends think I am quitting, just let them visit me in the bank. They will find me in the pilothouse close to the wheel, and my new job as chairman of the board carries all the authority to hold the old ship along the same course it has followed successfully for 78 years.” Under the direction of Turner, First National moved farther out into the Memphis community, opening locations on South Third, at Second and Linden, and in the Berclair neighborhood on Summer. Another branch opened in the new Poplar Plaza shopping center at Poplar and Highland, the first shopping complex in Memphis built outside of the downtown area. It was an excellent location, adjoining the new Plaza Theater. “Wired music and the open counter-type windows provide a pleasantly informal atmosphere,” reported the Press-Scimitar, also noting the new bank’s “soft, indirect lighting, green fabric sofas, and gold-framed reproductions of Audubon prints.” A downstairs clubroom would be available to the public for use by “civic, charitable, religious, or educational

organizations.” This attractive building, still standing, eventually became home to a bookstore. Then the company embarked on something that would begin to change the way customers used banks. In 1950 First National purchased a parking lot at 224 Madison and opened the city’s first “motorbranch bank.” Newspapers explained the new concept: “On the parking lot will be an island with two drive-in windows to accommodate those who want to make deposits without leaving their cars. An intercommunication system permits conversation between teller and customer.” If anyone was nervous about this new method of banking, The Commercial Appeal reassured them that the branch “was equipped with the latest developments in safety features.” Despite the initial concerns about branch banking, First National’s neighborhood banks did catch on, and by 1955, the company operated “eight strategically located branches in widely separated sections of the city.” According to the annual report published that year, “These offices account for approximately 32 percent of the bank’s total deposits (excluding those of correspondent banks) and 60 percent of its installment credit loans. The branches are spacious, attractively designed, and modern in every respect. With the exception of trust and investment services, they offer the same facilities as the parent bank, and their ready acceptance by the banking public has furnished conclusive evidence of their need.” In 1960, Turner stepped down as president and Allen Morgan Sr., formerly with the bank’s bond division, was named the new president of First National. Turner was named chairman of the board. First National Bank had been in continuous operation in Memphis for nearly a hundred years. Under the able direction of Norfleet Turner and Allen Morgan, the bank would celebrate its centennial in a most dramatic fashion. •

“On the parking lot will be an island with two drive-in windows to accommodate those who want to make deposits without leaving their cars. An intercommunication system permits conversation between teller and customer.”

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Untitled

by adele lemm (1904-1977) Born in Wisconsin, Lemm studied art in Memphis at Siena College (now the site of First Tennessee Bank’s Ron Terry Center), and taught for 23 years at the Memphis Academy of Arts. The New York Times described her work, which employed building blocks of color, as “semi-cubist academism.”

“Last year witnessed the greatest growth in the bank’s history, and the potential for growth is such that the bank will require additional space for the expansion of its own operations within a few years.” — norfleet tur ner

STEEL & GLASS 47

b e l o w a nd r i g h t: Architectural renderings

of 165 Madison Avenue.

Local newspapers speculated about the size, shape, height, and even color of the new building, but the designers remained mum until they finally unveiled their plans. What the renderings revealed was a stunning steel and glass tower, ultramodern in every detail.

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Changing the Skyline

5 ∂

A gleaming new headquarters building set the stage for monumental growth throughout the state — and beyond.

s it APPrOACheD its 100th anniversary, First national Bank had outgrown the space in the building at second and Madison. in July 1962, board chairman norfleet turner told the Memphis PressScimitar, “Last year witnessed the greatest

growth in the bank’s history, and the potential for growth is such that the bank will require additional space for the expansion of its own operations within a few years.” Looking around for a new place to call home, bank officials didn’t

have to search very far. They found an ideal site just one block east, at the southwest corner of Third and Madison, a half-block occupied by THE Fir ST TEN NESSEE STOry

T o p : A key for the new building. a b o v e : The construction site in 1962.

a downtown Memphis landmark, the Goodwyn Institute. William Adolphus Goodwyn lived only a few years in Memphis, working here as a cotton merchant in the 1850s. But when he died in Nashville in 1898, he left the Bluff City a remarkable gift — enough money to build a public library and office building, with an endowment for an annual series of lectures. Opened in 1907, the Goodwyn Institute included a 900-seat auditorium, several f loors of rental office space, and the studios of WMC Radio. But by the 1960s the seven-story building was showing its age, lacking amenities such as central air conditioning and modern electrical systems. Most of the original tenants had moved out, and the auditorium was far too large for the lecture series. So bank officials made an intriguing proposal: First National would swap buildings with the Goodwyn Institute. The bank would demolish the old building and erect a new headquarters on the site, and the Institute would move into the former bank building as soon as First National vacated it. Since that building lacked an auditorium, the lecture series would move to then-Memphis State University, and the library, which had grown into an impressive technical and business collection, would be relocated to the Cossitt branch of the Memphis Public Library system. What sounded like a feasible plan quickly met with opposition from a small group of Memphians calling themselves the Committee for the Preservation of the Goodwyn Institute Research Library, Auditorium Lecture Program, and Trust. Many years previous, the Institute had been deeded to the state of Tennessee. The group questioned whether private developers could purchase the building and also noted that — according to the original charter — the library and lecture series had to remain one entity. The preservation committee filed suit to stop the swap of the properties, and the dispute dragged on for months. The Tennessee Court of Appeals ultimately ruled in the bank’s favor, and the Tennessee Supreme Court refused to overturn it. The final action was a resolution passed by the Tennessee House of Representatives, signed by Governor Buford Ellington, approving of the transaction. Since one concern was that the Goodwyn Institute would

lose money because it wouldn’t be able to rent any office space until it could move into the former bank building, First National agreed to donate $1,000 a month to the group. With this action, the Goodwyn Institute supporters finally agreed that this was “a great step forward” and would allow them to “dispose of an obsolete building.” Demolition by Chandler Wrecking Company began in 1961. It only took a few weeks to clear the site, and parts of the old building have survived. The four columns from the façade were purchased by Memphis recording artist Bette Stalnecker, who remembered the recitals she held in the auditorium, and were placed on her house in Memphis’ Central Gardens neighborhood. In addition, three of the terra-cotta lions’ heads that decorated the building ended up gracing a courtyard fountain outside the First National Bank building (now the home of First Tennessee’s FTB Advisors group) at Poplar and Mendenhall, where they can still be seen today. First National hired the Memphis architectural firm of Walk C. Jones to design the new headquarters, which the bank announced would be the largest office building ever erected in Memphis. Newspapers speculated about the size, shape, height, and even color of the building, but the designers remained mum until they finally unveiled their plans. What the renderings revealed was a stunning steel and glass tower, ultra-modern in every detail. It would include two sub-basements, soar 24 stories tall, and contain more than 370,000 square feet of office space. First National would occupy about half of that — taking the first seven floors and the top floor, with intervening floors leased to various businesses. From the beginning, First National made sure to employ only the best architects, engineers, designers, contractors, and consultants. William H. Mueser of New York City, who had designed the foundations for the Golden Gate Bridge, consulted with builders about the bank, which sat on steel piers driven 40 feet below the surface, reaching a hard sand strata “as solid and secure as bedrock.” The building contractor for the project was J.A. Jones of Memphis and Charlotte, which was in the process of building the new terminal building for Memphis International Airport and had constructed the Union Avenue wing of Baptist Memorial Hospital and the Ten-

Trying to describe the modern interior, a newspaper reporter said that “newly completed plans stress the exotic.”

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nessee Valley Authority’s Thomas H. Allen Steam Plant. Construction would take two years, and newspapers kept track of progress, reporting a number of “firsts” involving the new building. For one thing, reporters assured readers that the bank would not have an air strip. That long concrete ramp stretching downward into the excavation was designed for bulldozers and other heavy equipment — not airplanes. The excavation was indeed enormous; First National would have the largest underground parking lot in the city, with space for more than 200 cars. The bank lobby was described as “the most spacious building entrance area of any office structure in Memphis.” A special window-washing gadget called a “spider” would creep on rails around the perimeter of the roof, raising and lowering a platform for the washing crews. The bank of high-speed elevators would be electronically controlled and have an automatic intercom system, so that an elevator “starter” stationed in the lobby could keep track of passengers’ progress. The building’s central air-conditioning system was the largest in Shelby County. Cranes hoisted the 300,000-pound Trane unit in place on the roof, and newspapers reported the system could cool precisely 805 average-sized homes. The interior design seemed to baffle the newspaper writers. A Press-Scimitar reporter said that “newly completed plans stress the exotic.” She noted that the lobby would feature “marble imported from Italy, columns of shimmering aluminum, and wall-to-wall carpeting.” The main entrance on Madison Avenue would feature a “marble chip” floor, imbedded with heating coils “to keep snow and ice from forming there.” Most impressive of all would be the rooftop-mounted sign, “the largest illuminated sign in Shelby County.” Built by Cummings & Company, the sign would feature the bank’s distinctive “1st” logo, constructed in porcelain enamel panels 12 feet high and 26 feet wide. The sign would be outlined with more than a half-mile of colored neon tubing, which sign company officials said would make the sign “readable from an estimated distance of four to five miles.” The topping-out ceremony took place on May 16, 1963. In accordance with construction industry tradition, an evergreen tree was raised to the highest point of the building, some 300 feet above the sidewalks. The last structural steel column, painted gold and signed by bank employees, was hoisted in place. Finally, hundreds of helium-filled balloons were released, some of them filled with gift certificates that would allow the finder to open a First National savings account. Memphis newspaper columnist Eldon Roark was allowed to tour the new building just before it opened. “I expected to see beauty and exquisite furnishings,” he wrote in a March 1964 T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

l e g a c y

o f

l e a D e r s h i p

Allen B. Morgan Sr.

ailed by The Commercial Appeal as “the father of the investment business in Memphis,” Allen Morgan joined the bond department of First national Bank in 1929. The graduate of Washington and Lee University was named manager of the department in 1933. After a stint as a lieutenant commander in the U.s. navy during World War ii — one of many First national employees to serve the country during this period — he returned to Memphis and was named an executive vice president of First national in 1946. in 1960 he was elected president of the bank, working closely with chairman of the board norfleet turner to oversee the firm’s transition into the new headquarters building. Morgan was named CeO in 1967 and became chairman of the board of First tennessee national Corporation, the bank’s holding company. he retired in 1973 and is remembered by his friends and colleagues as “a real banker’s banker.” When Morgan died in 1998, First tennessee chairman and CeO ron terry told reporters, “he was a great leader and highly respected as a banker nationwide. The thing all of us who grew up under him liked about his management style was that you always knew where you stood with him, and he was dedicated to promotion from within.” During his 44-year career with First national, and later First tennessee, Morgan saw the company develop from a single bank with assets of some $20 million to a holding company with 150 offices statewide and deposits approaching $1.5 billion. Morgan, the father of Allen Morgan Jr., founder of the Morgan Keegan brokerage firm in Memphis, was involved in countless business and civic endeavors. he served as chairman of the group that raised funds to build Le Bonheur Children’s hospital, helped establish the Future Memphis organization, was a director and treasurer of the Memphis rotary Club, and served on the boards of Memphis University school and trezevant Manor. Other business associations included board membership of holiday inns, south Central Bell, Continental Baking, Murphy Oil Company, and Federal Company (which later became tyson Foods), among others. Morgan also helped another Memphis institution become a household name. Friends with developer Kemmons Wilson, he helped arrange the initial construction financing for the fledgling holiday inn chain. When the chain became a national success story, Look magazine published a photo of Morgan (far right), Wilson (center), and John Brown, president of Union Planters Bank, in a swimming pool filled with money. in the late 1960s Morgan worked with Mayor henry Loeb and other city leaders to try to end the sanitation workers’ strike and was instrumental in the formation of today’s United Way. “Before Morgan,” said terry, “we really didn’t have any unified giving in Memphis.” •

column, “but I wasn’t prepared for such breath-taking magnificence.” Like others, he was particularly impressed with the size of the main banking room, noting that “the walls are paneled in teak” and “it’s really something to see.” He continued, “The rest of the building is quite a show, too — desks to match paneling, patios, fountains, an aquarium, real plants (and some trees), more carpeting (two acres in all), and soft Muzak coming from hidden speakers.” In his tongue-in-cheek style, Roark pointed out one discrepancy in the modern design: “Although everything is spanking new, I noticed that the large offices of Norfleet Turner, chairman of the board, and Allen Morgan, president, had pretty but old rugs on the floor. I was told they were Oriental rugs close to a hundred years old. Well, they are still in good shape. And I think it was very commendable of Mr. Turner and Mr. Morgan to let subordinates have new rugs while they make do with used ones. After everything is paid for, maybe they can have new ones, too.” As the building neared completion, the bank began to move from its old headquarters. Ralph Horn, who would later serve as president and chairman of First Tennessee, had joined the bank in 1963, right out of college. His first job was with the bond division, and he remembers his group was the first to move into the new building. “As far as I remember, the transition was pretty seamless,” he said. “We moved into the seventh floor, and for a while we were all by ourselves up there.” He remembers that only one employee lost her job because of the move to the new building. “We lost Kitty,” he said. “She was the elevator operator in the old building. They didn’t have buttons there. You told her what floor you wanted, and she turned a big wheel and then opened the grate and let you on and off. But we just didn’t have a need for her with the new elevators.” First National Bank officially opened its 165 Madison Avenue headquarters on March 23, 1964 — almost 100 years to the day since the bank’s founding during the Civil War. City and county officials stood by as Mayor William Ingram, noting that “First National Bank is building a new image,” snipped a blue ribbon across the entrance. Newspapers reported, “The First National Bank choir stood on steps on the plaza against the building and sang a number of selections.” After brief remarks by Norfleet Turner and Allen Morgan, the new bank was open for business.

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

It was quite a place. A squad of tour guides, dressed like airline stewardesses, stood by to show off the facility. During the first week of opening, visitors were treated to a series of special exhibitions in the lobby, including displays of ancient coins, a series of original watercolor paintings telling “The Story of Money,” other paintings depicting the world of Shakespeare, and even a collection of Civil War photographs. The new bank also had a unique element. A pair of colorful parrots — real ones — greeted visitors in the lobby. They apparently didn’t have a long stay. Bank officials no doubt realized that squawking birds that listen carefully and repeat what they hear weren’t the best things to have in a room where banking transactions take place. They were quickly replaced by a pair of doves. Just as the bank is celebrating its 150th anniversary in 2014, so the gleaming tower that has served as its downtown headquarters celebrates its 50th birthday the same year. The authors of Memphis: An Architectural Guide noted that the design paid tribute to New York City’s landmark Seagram Building by famed architect Mies van der Rohe and acknowledged that “this was the first tall building in Memphis of a truly modernist cast.” The 1960s didn’t always produce great American architecture, and many buildings erected half a century ago now show their age, but 165 Madison has maintained its timeless appeal, still looking as new and modern today as the day it opened. •

Many buildings erected half a century ago now show their age, but 165 Madison has maintained its timeless appeal, still looking as new and modern today as the day it opened.

b e l o w : Parrots were a unique feature of

the bank lobby when the downtown building first opened in 1964.

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First Tennessee Heritage Mural: Tennesseans (detail) by ted faiers (1908-1985) The panels of the First Tennessee Heritage Mural capture the people and places of Tennessee. In this detail from one of the panels, bank president Ron Terry is portrayed in the middle, the smiling gentleman with the grey hair and the gold eyeglasses.

First, however, came a new name: First Tennessee. In its 1971 report to shareholders, bank officials explained, “If we had to sum up our philosophy, it might be done in three words: Never Stand Still.”

MODERN TIMES

cha pter ∂

The Modern Era With a brand-new name, First Tennessee Bank’s growth extended beyond the horizon.

6 ∂

ettLeD intO its new home overlooking downtown Memphis, First national Bank stood in a good position to begin its next century. it had endured war, yellow fever, the Great Depression, and other obstacles and had survived as one of the oldest banks in the country; fewer than a hundred American banks with earlier charters were

still operating in the early 1960s. in 1964, the Memphis bank reported more than $460 million in deposits and

total resources of close to half a billion dollars, making First national one of the 100 largest banks in the country — a dramatic evolution from the small firm that began with assets of $100,000. The staff had increased to 113 officers

l e f t: in 1964, one of the star attractions at the bank’s 100th anniversary gala was this massive cake, topped by a model of the new building, and decorated with dollar bills.

THE Fir ST TEN NESSEE STOry

r i g h t: “We’re fi rst in Tennessee” was the concept behind the campaign to change the bank name to First Tennessee, with ads using this handpainted silhouette mask.

and more than 840 full-time employees; 35 other companies had leased space in the new headquarters building, an occupancy rate of 95 percent. And from that original bank on Madison, First National had expanded throughout the city, opening 17 branches in various neighborhoods, with plans to add five more within a year. The business wasn’t confined to Tennessee; the bank maintained accounts with more than 80 institutions in 24 countries. The real growth, however, was just about to begin.

above

First Tennessee Heritage Mural: Hernando Desoto by ted faiers (1908-1985) The Spanish explorer (1497-1542) is credited with discovering the Mississippi River. Historians still debate where, exactly, he crossed it.

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t sta rted w ith a lit tle piece of pl a stic . In 1967, First National introduced its customers to BankAmericard, the first nationally recognized credit card. In the first year alone, more than 150,000 cards were issued to customers, with the cards accepted at more than 10,000 retail establishments in the Mid-South — an innovation that, according to bank officials, “promises great potential in the future.” The bank began an aggressive campaign to reach younger customers with its “First Association” program. Targeted to men and women ages 21 to 35, the program offered them free checking accounts, reduced-cost safe deposit rental, a BankAmericard, free financial counseling, and other services. Expanding its footprint in downtown Memphis, First National constructed an ultra-modern Operations Computer Service Center, complete with a rooftop heliport, on Danny Thomas Boulevard, in an area that had been cleared as part of the city’s urban renewal program. Inside, taking up most of an entire floor, a state-of-the-art General Electric 225 computer system was described as “an electronic brain that sorts, reads, and posts items to customers’ accounts. It can read at the rate of 41,600 characters per minute” — unheard-of speed at the time. First National announced plans to open three other centers, in Alabama, Mississippi, and Missouri. Next came plans to acquire more “brick and mortar” establishments. In 1969 the First National Holding Corporation was formed, setting the stage for acquisitions throughout the state. Banking laws had previously limited any First National mergers and acquisitions (and other banks too, for that matter) to banks within Shelby County, but new laws eliminated those restrictions. First, however, came a new name: First Tennessee. In its 1971 report to stockholders, bank officials explained, “If we had to sum up our operating philosophy, it might be done in three words: Never Stand Still.” Although First National Holding Corporation had been formed just two years before, the company realized, “There were already other First Nationals, and we decided that we should be special. We decided on First Tennessee National

Corporation for the new name. It told the world where we’re from. It pinpointed the nerve center of our expanded international operations. And still we retained the momentum of First National — the flagship that made it all possible.” Expansion began in small steps. One of the new holding company’s first moves was to acquire The Banking and Trust Company, across the state in Jonesboro, Tennessee. That was followed by the Whites Creek Bank and Trust Company in Davidson County just outside Nashville. Affiliation agreements were reached with three other Tennessee banks: The Bank of Morristown, Kingsport National Bank, and the First Bank and Trust Company of Dyersburg. The Memphis bank wasn’t just acquiring small banks; these were part of a strategic vision to expand the First Tennessee brand into the state’s “top 20 counties in our economic index.” Allen Morgan retired in 1972. In his final report to stockholders, he wrote, “The milestone year 1972 saw First Tennessee National Corporation cross the threshold of becoming a fully diversified financial services company.” As the result of a “carefully planned look into our future,” one of his last acts as chairman was to oversee the reorganization of the bank into five major divisions: regional banking; community banking; real estate; finance and insurance; and financial services. The finance and insurance division was especially active in the early 1970s, acquiring or merging with Crown Finance Corporation, with some 60 offices in the Midwest, and Norlen Life Insurance Company. First Tennessee had a new face at the helm in 1973. Replacing Allen Morgan as chairman and CEO was Ron Terry, who had joined the bank in 1957 as a management trainee. As part of what Terry described as an “active acquisition program,” First Tennessee quickly added six more banks, with plans to acquire others. By the end of 1973, First Tennessee’s 14 banks served customers in the state’s six largest metropolitan areas. The bank now had more than 150 offices — including an international office in Nassau in the Bahamas. First Tennessee, although known for its conservative banking philosophy, wasn’t afraid of challenges. In 1976, when the financially troubled Hamilton Bank of Chattanooga shuttered its doors in one of the worst bank failures in the state’s history, First Tennessee stepped in and acquired the facility. There was a sound reason behind this decision. “The result was a substantial entry into the Chattanooga market, which was the last major market in Tennessee where we had no presence,” Terry explained. First Tennessee was now serving some 15 percent of the state’s banking market. Under the umbrella name of First Tennessee Bank, the firm was now the state’s largest banking organization, with combined assets exceeding $2 billion. “First Tennessee’s goal,” said Terry, “is to provide a geographic breadth the f i r st 1 5 0

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First Tennessee Heritage Mural: Tennessee Valley Authority by ted faiers (1908-1985) Established by an act of Congress in 1933, the Tennessee Valley Authority helped bring the state out of the Great Depression, by constructing electrical generating stations, dams, flood control projects, and other public improvements throughout the region. Today, TVA remains one of the state’s largest employers.

From that original bank on Madison, First National had expanded throughout the city, opening 17 branches, with plans to add five more within the year. The business wasn’t confined to the state of Tennessee; the bank maintained accounts with 80 financial institutions in 24 countries.

a b o v e : An undated photograph shows

the bank’s board members in the early 1960s, when the executive offices were on the third floor of 165 Madison.

of banking services unparalleled in Tennessee’s history.” That reach across the state grew even larger with the 1983 acquisition of United American Bank in Knoxville. Another well-publicized bank failure, the purchase involved what Terry described as “some judicious risk-taking,” but it gave First Tennessee a major presence in the state’s largest cities. As the bank celebrates its 150th anniversary, in the state’s major cities that presence remains a very visible one. In the state capital, First Tennessee is the major tenant in the Nashville City Center, at 27 stories the sixth-tallest structure in the downtown area, located just two blocks from the capitol building. First Tennessee is the anchor tenant in the 27-story First Tennessee Plaza, the tallest building in Knoxville and occupying an entire block in the heart of downtown. The gleaming mirror-glass tower, topped with the First Tennessee flag, was originally constructed in 1978 as headquarters for the Jake and C.H. Butcher banking empire. And in Chattanooga, the 17-story First Tennessee Bank building on Market Street, offering a sweeping vista of the Tennessee River, is the second-tallest building in the city.

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irst Tennessee Bank embraced technological advances during this period of unprecedented growth. The bank carefully studied “where customers prefer to bank, the amount of time they are willing to allow for banking activities, and when they choose to perform these transactions.” Their conclusion was that more and more customers needed an option other than walking into a traditional bank lobby. First Tennessee had, years earlier, pioneered drive-through banking. In the late 1970s, it added another innovation: “automated teller machines.” Although other banks had added ATMS at their existing facilities, First Tennessee took it a step further, building freestanding First Place ATM centers throughout the city and state. These offered drive-through ATM service, or a small lobby for walk-up customers. The buildings themselves were not only quite attractive, but completely functional and easily constructed. “The structural concept for housing the freestanding machines was pioneered by First Tennessee,” according to the bank’s annual report. “The design allows the unit to be prefabricated off-site, brought to the location by truck, lowered into place, and activated — in as little as 24 hours.” It’s hard to remember an innocent time without security cameras, but in a Memphis Press-Scimitar article headlined “Robbers Beware,” the newspaper warned would-be thieves that First Tennessee branches now had “photo-guards,’” described as a “special-type bank guard.” For anyone who still didn’t get the picture, the article explained that video cameras would provide “a running record of everything that goes on in a branch during the day, so if a hold-up man ventures into a branch, he can be assured of having his picture taken.” Another new product was the bank’s new Visa First Banking debit card, which newspapers explained “allows customers access to their checking accounts without the use of paper checks.” The new concept was popular from the beginning, with more than 86,000 debit cards issued in the first year. All those paper checks also provided First Tennessee with a brand-new business. In 1981, the bank teamed up with another company that would become a Memphis institution — Federal Express Corporation — to form First Express, the nation’s first overnight check-clearing service. Anytime a customer wrote a check, it had to be physically returned to the issuing bank for clearing, the sooner the better. An operations center was constructed at Memphis International Airport to house the new operation, which not only handled checks for First Tennessee clients, but other banks in the region as well. In fact, within just a few years, First Express was processing more than one mil-

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lion checks every night for banks throughout the United States. The decade of the 1970s had been a low point in Memphis history. Following the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, the city’s downtown became a ghost town, as business owners followed customers eastward, and Time magazine famously described Memphis as a “backwater river town.” Even so, First Tennessee’s headquarters continued to shine brightly on the horizon, and Terry joined a consortium of other bankers to provide financing for the renovation and operation of The Peabody. When the “South’s Grand Hotel” reopened in 1983, it served as the spark for renewed vigor in downtown development, which eventually saw the reopening of the old Malco Theatre as a performing-arts venue called The Orpheum, a complete facelift for the Mid-America Mall, and other ventures that gave Memphis new life. Playing a major role in all this was the Memphis Jobs Conference, chaired for several years by Ron Terry. A series of town hall meetings, it attracted more than 2,000 key business leaders who laid out specific action plans for job growth and economic development. More importantly, the Jobs Conference inspired local business leaders — among them Fred Smith of FedEx, J.R. “Pitt” Hyde of Malone and Hyde (and later AutoZone), and Michael Rose of Holiday Inns — to play a more active role in the city’s affairs. During the early 1980s First Tennessee also made significant contributions to the burgeoning arts scene, with the First Bravo Awards presenting more than $100,000 annually to local artists and organizations to help them turn their dreams into reality. During this same period, the bank was actively working on its own major art project, the First Tennessee Heritage Collection (see Chapter One). First Tennessee, it seems, never stopped looking for ventures with other organizations, both public and private. It joined 11 other banks in handling the cost-management needs of the U.S. Postal Service, and during this same period processed tax payments for the massive Internal Revenue Service Centers in Austin, Texas, and Memphis, which handled federal tax returns for 12 states throughout the South and Southwest. A new All-in-One Account, first offered in 1983, was designed to deepen relationships with customers by combining checking, insurance, and the bank’s Visa card, along with other services, for one low annual rate. The venture proved enticing to customers, with more than 48,000 All-in-One Accounts opened that first year alone. To further reach customers, First Tennessee now operated some 140 banking locations

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

throughout the state — an increase of 25 percent in one year. In 1989, First Tennessee National Bank Association celebrated its 125th anniversary. The little bank founded on a Memphis street corner by Frank Davis during the Civil War had endured, probably beyond his wildest dreams. One of the 100 largest bank holding companies in the United States, First Tennessee now had assets of more than $5 billion, with deposits exceeding $4.5 billion. Its 153 locations served customers in 18 counties throughout the state. First Tennessee’s ATM network was the largest in the state, and the bank had recently opened branches inside grocery stores. First Tennessee was clearly holding true to its mission statement: “Be the best at serving our customers, one opportunity at a time.” Despite all this good news, in his letter to shareholders, Ron Terry warned: “And where is Tennessee headed? To begin with, not toward a ‘boom’ period.” In fact, the next 25 years would prove to be the most challenging in the bank’s long history.

a b o v e : First Place ATM centers

resembled miniature bank branches.

First Tennessee also made significant contributions to the burgeoning arts scene, with its First Bravo Awards presenting more than $100,000 annually to local artists and organizations.

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L e a d e r s h i p

Ron Terry

or more than two decades, First Tennessee Bank chairman and CEO Ron Terry was the best-known banker in the city and one of Memphis’ most visible business and civic leaders. He quickly established a reputation — along with Fred Smith of Federal Express, J.R. “Pitt” Hyde of AutoZone, and Michael Rose of Holiday Inns — as somebody to approach for advice, assistance, and yes, funding for civic projects.

A 1952 graduate of then-Memphis State College, Terry did post-graduate work at the Southwestern Graduate School of Banking and also attended the Harvard Advanced Management Program. He joined First National in 1957 as a management trainee in the bank’s correspondent banking division after four years in the U.S. Navy and quickly advanced through the ranks. He was named vice president in 1963, senior vice president in 1968, and executive vice president in 1971. He became president of First Tennessee later that same year. Making the announcement, chairman Allen Morgan said, “Ron Terry represents the aggressive, well-trained young banker of the future.” He became chairman and CEO in 1973, and during his 20-year tenure First Tennessee became the state’s largest bank holding company. Terry served as president of both the Federal Advisory Board to the Federal Reserve System and the Reserve City Bankers’ Association, composed of the nation’s largest banks. He was also chairman of the American Bankers Association committee that, under his leadership, played a major role in developing legislation that reshaped the nation’s financial services industry. Terry distinguished himself as one of Memphis’ most influential civic leaders. He served as chairman of the 1981 Memphis Jobs Conference, which set the agenda for a decade of the city’s growth. He played a key role in providing bank financing to resurrect the historic Peabody Hotel, which sparked the redevelopment of downtown Memphis. And he led the movement that ultimately founded the Shelby Farms Conservancy, to protect and preserve one of the nation’s largest urban parks. In addition to serving on several corporate boards, including Holiday Inns, BellSouth, and AutoZone, Terry served on the board of directors of St. Jude

Children’s Research Hospital, the University of Tennessee, Rhodes College, the Boys Club of Memphis, Arts Appreciation, Inc., and others. He was president of Future Memphis, chairman of Baptist Hospital’s Community Advisory Board, and a member of the University of Memphis Ambassadors Club. “I’m highly achievement-oriented,” he told a reporter. “I guess it’s my desire to be a winner.” In a recent interview, when asked his secret to being such a successful leader, he replied, “Listening. And remembering that God didn’t give us two ears and one mouth by mistake.” Always in demand for public office, Terry always turned down those requests. “I have no intention of running for elected office, now or in the future,” he told The Commercial Appeal in 1981. “And as far as getting bored with my job, we’re facing a set of challenges in the banking industry today that are so great that my job has almost become a new one in the last couple of years.” In 1982 Terry was one of only a dozen bankers nationwide summoned to the White House to discuss the national banking industry with President Ronald Reagan. Looking back on his long career, he told a reporter, “One of the things I played a heavy role in was building a statewide banking system. I bought 11 banks, but I’m not as proud of the actual number as the fact that they were put together right.” Among many honors, Terry was named Communicator of the Year by the Memphis chapter of the Public Relations Society of America and received the Outstanding Citizen award from the Greater Memphis Civitan Club. Presenting the Civitan award in 1980, the group’s president observed, “In all the years since 1953, when our first award was made, we have had men with tremendous records, but Ron Terry stands out like a giant.” •

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on Terry stepped down as chairman and CEO in 1995. Noting his company’s far-reaching endeavors, especially the growth of the bond and mortgage divisions, along with other ventures such as the First Express check-clearing service, which was now serving 60 of the nation’s 100 largest banks, he acknowledged, “First Tennessee’s unique business mix makes it more complex than a traditional bank.” In his last letter to shareholders, Terry noted that Forbes magazine had recently highlighted First Tennessee as “the rising star in the financial services industry.” He concluded, “Thanks to our team of outstanding employees, and working with the loyal customers and growing communities that we serve, First Tennessee’s future appears brighter than ever, and we look forward to meeting tomorrow’s challenges with the firm foundation developed in our past.” First Tennessee honored Terry’s lifelong contributions by naming its highly visible building on Poplar Avenue in East Memphis the Ron Terry Center. Terry was succeeded by Ralph Horn, who became the third president — after Norfleet Turner and Allen Morgan — to come out of the bank’s bond division. The bank continued to grow and expand, acquiring or merging with Home Financial Corporation, New South Bank, and Highland Capital Management. It also began a rather aggressive campaign to acquire mortgage companies in other states, such as Maryland National Mortgage Company, with 31 offices in the Northeast, and Sunbelt National Mortgage Company, with 40 offices scattered from California to Florida. With its “geographically diverse base of originations” now serving almost 30 states outside of Tennessee, the bank had moved into the top 25 mortgage operations nationally. In 1998 came one of the most dramatic changes in the bank’s history. First Tennessee employees received cards in the mail with an image of the state flag. Pinned to the card, almost right in the center, was a tiny badge depicting the central portion of the flag — the new logo for a holding company with a new name: First Horizon. First Tennessee also adopted the new logo. Along with the new logo and name came a new slogan: “All Things Financial.” Ralph Horn explained the reason behind the change: “Why would an old friend like First Tennessee change what is one of the most widely recognized logos in the state of Tennessee? The simple answer is that our company has changed. To many, the popular ‘1st’ had become an icon for Tennessee’s bank. And while we certainly see ourselves in that role, the First Tennes-

l e f t: First Tennessee maintains a very visible presence in Nashville’s 27-story City Center. b e l o w : Show me the money! The First Tennessee booth was hard to miss at the Main Street Festival in Franklin.

“Why would an old friend like First Tennessee change what is one of the most widely recognized logos in the state of Tennessee? The simple answer is that our company has changed.” — r a lph hor n

opposite

The Jolly Flat Boat Men (1847)

by thomas doney (active 1844-1852) Born in France, Doney spent his youth in Illinois, before moving to New York City, where he became a prolific engraver. The color engraving shown here is based on the painting by George Caleb Bingham, showing flatboatmen on the Mississippi River. b e l o w : A postcard helped show customers that the new “TennStar” logo was part of the Tennessee flag.

see of today is much more than that. Now we’re a multifaceted organization offering a full range of financial products.” What’s more, he noted the need “for a nationally recognized brand for businesses and products we market outside of Tennessee.” After all, the bond division, mortgage division, First Express, and other operations knew no state boundaries. “We felt it was time for a change,” said Horn, “to better reflect the growing nature of our company. In addition to symbolizing our diversity and growth, the new logo — inspired by the state flag of Tennessee — provides a reminder of our Tennessee heritage and our determination to build on our history.” The brick-and-mortar banks within Tennessee would still be called First Tennessee Bank, but would carry the new “flag” or “TennStar” logo. The holding company, along with most other operations, would now carry the First Horizon brand. Banks outside Tennessee, such as newly acquired branches in Virginia and North Carolina, would be called First Horizon Bank. (In 2009 these banks and others in South Carolina and Florida were rebranded First Tennessee when the Mid-Atlantic Region was organized.) The bond division, however, would be renamed FTN Financial “to maintain the brand that has become a symbol for excellence on Wall Street.” Ralph Horn retired in 2003 and was succeeded as chairman and CEO by Kenneth Glass, who had served as president of the First Tennessee banking group. Early in Glass’ tenure the company thrived, but just a few years later, the growing mortgage business began its downward spiral. With a mortgage-servicing portfolio of more than $68 billion at stake, Glass tried to reassure nervous shareholders, “There are doubters who don’t believe our strategy is sound. They’re not sure that our other businesses can take up the slack created by a down mortgage market.” Unfortunately, those doubters were right. The mortgage crisis caused by thousands of borrowers defaulting on adjustable-rate mortgages was a disastrous blow to mortgage businesses. First Tennessee didn’t escape the damage. Acknowledging that “2004 was a challenging year,” Glass reported bad news to shareholders: “We had no earnings growth for the first time in years.” First Tennessee faced a crisis, he said, because “the mortgage

business is crucial to our national strategy because it continues to give us the opportunity to cross-sell more financial services to its large customer base.” Those challenges continued through 2005 and 2006. In 2007, former executive vice president Gerald Baker was named president and CEO. When Baker became CEO, a new chairman of the First Horizon board was announced: Michael Rose, the former CEO of Holiday Inns, the chairman and CEO of the Promus Companies, chairman of Harrah’s Casino, and chairman of Nashville-based Gaylord Entertainment. Baker immediately announced the need for “additional opportunities to be more efficient” and announced that “costreduction initiatives have been put in place.” The newly named First Horizon Home Loans underwent a workforce reduction and a “restructuring of the sales management team.” Meanwhile, other areas of First Horizon continued to perform well, but the mortgage crisis — by then a national concern — was apparently not going away anytime soon. With more losses reported in 2006 and an overall workforce reduction of 20 percent, it was becoming clear that more drastic measures were needed. Bryan Jordan was named president and CEO of First Horizon National Corporation in 2008. Formerly chief financial officer with Regions Bank before joining First Horizon as CFO in 2007, Jordan was the first president who didn’t move to the top job without long tenure within the First Tennessee ranks. Jordan began his tenure by announcing, “We have exited our national lending business.” For years, First Horizon had serviced loans in more than 40 states. That came to an end on August 31, 2008, when the bank sold all of its mortgage origination and servicing capabilities outside the state of Tennessee. Other cost-cutting and “right-sizing” measures were put in place across the board — across the state, in fact — and today First Horizon faces the future with optimism. Jordan was elected chairman of First Horizon in 2012. In a recent Chairman’s Letter, he told shareholders, “In challenging times, the successful company adapts and strives to excel. During the last few years of recession and slow recovery, First Horizon has worked to become leaner, more flexible, and more responsive — better suited to navigate rough terrain. We controlled what we could control and prepared for what we could not.” After 150 years, First Tennessee Bank remains the numberone bank in the state, and one of the largest banks in the nation. Challenges remain ahead, but the horizon looks very bright. •

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right

First Tennessee Heritage Mural: Delta Queen

by ted faiers (1908-1985) Launched in 1927, the sternwheeler was a familiar sight along the Mississippi River for decades, its calliope beckoning passengers wherever it docked. The boat is currently moored in Chattanooga, where it operates as a luxury waterfront hotel.

Ro etur, tendero molorporum licia quod quatur, velibus eligni teni asit eostor ad moluptatium volorpo rporeces dicia “If you have a good veratio nsequia sunt asse relationship with a broker, re, voles volorae dolorectus, you are going to call him, cum reperfe rferis solorem. because you trust him. In Ut volore volorae cullit the end, people still buy ulparum ut reperum deliti from people.” bea sum que simpediciis” — micha el k isber — john doe 66

FTN FINANCIAL

cha pter ∂

Trading Floor 7

The

∂

FTN Financial has grown from a one-room bond department into a premier fixed-income firm with an international reputation.

irst National Bank’s bond division — in the early days it never had a fancier name than that — had been a key part of the bank’s operations since the 1920s. Vintage photos of the department,

taken in the old building at Second and Madison, show a spacious room, with neat rows of wooden desks along the walls, a dozen men in suits and ties writing letters or talking on the telephone, and secretaries sitting nearby, typing or taking dictation.

l e f t: Revamped in 2013, the new trading floor at the FTN Financial offices in Memphis organizes the salespeople in tiered seating, facing the trading “pit” in the center.

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

r i g h t: The well-known “TennStar” logo, an element from the state flag, is visible everywhere at First Tennessee. Here, employees at FTN Financial are reflected in the etched glass.

customers’ needs better than anyone, then pushing themselves to make the connections necessary to earn the business, time after time. Lewis was assigned the southern region of Missouri, and some 50 years later still remembered his very first sale. “I was on this little road to Springfield, which was so small that it even forded streams — and this wasn’t in the days of Model T Fords,” he said. “I called on the tiny state bank in Cabool, Missouri, and they bought two $1,000 municipal bonds from Detroit.” As with other areas of the bank, technology changed the way the bond division worked in a very basic way. “We each had a telephone on our desk, and it had four toggle switches for four outside lines,” said Lewis. “That was all you had. But then, in the 1960s, they came out with WATS [Wide Area Telephone Service], and all of a sudden you could make thousands of long-distance calls for a low cost. Nobody realized it at the time, but that was one of the key drivers in how we started growing like we did.”

O ABOVE : As depicted in 1938, the bank’s

bond division resembled a library. o p p o s i t e p a g e : In 1905, the Memphis Country Club offered $500 bonds.

“We sought and found people who were young, experienced, and professional, and we invested considerable time in training them.” — r a lph hor n 70

Many years later, “those telephones were pretty much the most advanced piece of equipment we used,” remembered George Lewis, who started working in First National’s bond division in 1961. The Memphian had joined the Army after graduating from Central High and studied management and sales at thenMemphis State University. Unlike many college students, Lewis had a specific goal in mind when he got out of school. “I wanted to get into sales, and I knew I wanted to get into selling something that wasn’t physical — like securities.” Training in those days was rather basic. “They gave you a little booklet about the bond department,” said Lewis, “and that was it.” Back then, bond salesmen spent a week making calls by phone, then a week in their cars, making sales calls in person. Then as now, the bank was proud of the personal relationships employees established with customers. Employees at today’s FTN Financial still pride themselves on understanding their

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ne of Lewis’ colleagues in those early days was Ralph Horn, who began his financial career in the bond division and ended it as chairman of First Horizon. While Lewis worked with about a dozen salesmen in the municipal bond side, dealing with city and town bonds, Horn had only two or three colleagues when he started selling government bonds. “I grew up on a farm near Corinth, Mississippi, where we grew our own food,” he said. At Mississippi State College he studied general business, then was quickly hired by First National. “I graduated from school on a Friday, took the weekend off, and started working at the bank on Monday,” he laughed. “I stayed there until they ran me off in 2003.” Horn admitted that he “didn’t know squat about banking. But in those days, they had a trainee program where you worked six months in one department, six months in another to see where you fit, or if you even fit at all. My first assignment was the bond division, and I loved it so I stayed there.” When he took over the division, like Lewis, he realized the compensation system wasn’t competitive. Horn eventually convinced Ron Terry, bank chairman and CEO at the time, to let the bond salespeople earn a straight commission. “So all of a sudden,” Horn recalled, “we had a lot of people who wanted to work for us.” The bank also hired a consultant to make sweeping changes to their facilities. Among them was the move, in 1983, to spacious offices in a brand-new building on Crossover Lane, in a suburban

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area of East Memphis where FTN is still headquartered today. “We had a huge trading floor, and monitors were put in, linking us with the Bloomberg data system, which gave us instantaneous access to the markets,” said Horn. “I think Merrill Lynch and First Tennessee had that about a year before anybody else. It made a huge difference, and so we kept growing and growing.” The sales reps used that information to match products with what they knew their customers needed and wanted. Not only was Horn helping the division blaze trails logistically, but also legislatively. In 1971, First Tennessee was instrumental in encouraging the Tennessee state legislature to pass The Tennessee Municipal Securities Act of 1972. It set up a seven-member board to test and license Tennessee firms and their salepeople and traders. It ultimately led to the U.S. Congress passing the Securities Amendment Act of 1975 that resulted in the formation of the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board. Another factor that played a role in the bond division’s steady growth over the years was Memphis’ location in a rich agricultural region. “Part of the original focus [of the division] had to do with the agricultural lending cycle that goes on in the MidSouth,” explained Jim Vogel, an executive vice president at FTN Financial who has worked for the company since 1979. “The farmers and growers collected their payments after the harvest in the fall and then had excess money they needed to invest with someone they trusted until they had to make payments again for their spring planting.” Working with other correspondent banks throughout the Southeast, First National invested this influx of capital in bonds and fixed-return investments. The bond division, Vogel continued, “helped them work in their investment portfolios in that very agricultural-centric cycle, and that’s what gave us the customer base that allowed us to grow.”

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n 1982 the bond division opened a regional office in Mobile, Alabama, followed by other branches in Knoxville, Charlotte, and Palm Beach, Florida. The regional expansion quickly paid off. In one year alone revenues almost doubled, from $13 million in 1984 to nearly $26 million in 1985. Of course, a lot of that success had to do with the hard-working staff. “We sought and found people who were young, experienced, and professional,” said Horn, “and we invested considerable time in training them to do business the First Tennessee way.” It wasn’t just about pushing products, he explained; it was about matching their customers’ needs with the right products at the right time. Selecting the right talent has remained a key focus through the

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

ABOVE : When a rookie makes his first

trade, his tie is cut off and hung in a gallery at FTN Financial.

“To differentiate ourselves, we added a level of expertise so that people would rely on First Tennessee for their business.” — fr a nk gusmus 72

decades. “We look for people who aren’t afraid to roll up their sleeves and work hard. People who can put in time and learn and grow with the firm,” said Tim Romanow, trading manager for FTN Financial. Frank Gusmus joined the bond division as the chief financial officer in 1982, back when the group had less than 40 employees. “We were a small local firm at that point and did business primarily with banks in the surrounding three or four states,” he recalled. “But we gradually grew our organization, selling more and more bonds to different banks.” Gusmus, who later became president of FTN Financial before retiring in 2010, remembered when the firm bought its first two computers: “We had two little Apple or Compaq computers. That was it. When we bought and sold bonds, it was all verbal.” Another important piece of equipment? “We had a white board,” he said. “You’d write on that board that we had a million of Memphis city municipals, and if somebody wanted them, they’d yell to the trader, and they’d go hand-write it.” That was pretty much the extent of the technology back then, which still relied on phones and fax machines for communicating

with clients. “We did a lot of faxes,” said Gusmus. “If a customer needed information about a bond, we’d fax it to them. That’s all we had.” By the early 1990s the bond division was one of the fastest growing departments of First Tennessee, and it wasn’t confined to the Mid-South. In his annual letter to shareholders, Chairman Ron Terry reported, “The most dramatic example of growth on an international scale has been in investment banking. Through an expanded sales force, we now have customers in all 50 states. During 1992, we underwrote, as senior manager, a total of $4.4 billion of direct debt of U.S. government agencies, ranking us fifth in the country and above many of the Wall Street securities dealers.” At that time, the First Tennessee bond division worked directly with more than 25 percent of the largest banks in the United States. As a result of this growth, the division earned a new name, in 1993 becoming First Tennessee Capital Markets. Within a few years, the department was ranked as the second largest underwriter of agency securities in the nation, just behind the national firm of Merrill Lynch and above Salomon Brothers, Morgan Stanley, and Goldman Sachs, among others. A major change was made in 1993 that contributed to the remarkable growth in the years that followed. “By 1993, with customer-focused products and services, we had captured the dominant share of the business with depository institutions,” said Michael E. Kisber, the current president of FTN Financial. “Jimmie Hughes, our leader, focused on the fact that we were depository-centric and decided to diversify our customer base; thus began the Alternative Account Group, alternative meaning any institutional account that was not a depository, such as insurance companies, money managers, state and local governments, as well as international accounts.” This strategy really paid off. “If you fast-forward to today, FTN Financial covers approximately 5,500 institutional accounts worldwide, doing business in over 40 countries. Our business is well-balanced between depository and non-depository accounts, with non-depositories representing between 40 to 60 percent of our revenue.” First Tennessee Capital Markets continued expansion on a national basis, adding even more regional offices. Rod Turner, FTN Financial executive vice president and director of sales, explained, “I joined the firm in 1995, and that was a very exciting time. We were gaining national prominence with our agency business, and we continued to climb in the rankings with our underwriting. So we decided to capitalize on that by expanding nationally.” FTN Financial opened major offices in Kansas City, Dallas, and Chicago. “In 1998 we went to New York City, which serves

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as one of our flagship offices today,” Turner said. “It was always the goal of our firm to have an office there, in the financial capital of the world. “We had a huge success there,” Turner continued. “In a very short time we experienced tremendous growth.” Today, the New York office, with more than 100 employees, is the largest office outside of Memphis. FTN Financial now has 22 offices, including one in Hong Kong. In fact, said Turner, “Some 50 percent of all FTN Financial revenue is produced outside of Memphis on a daily basis.” In 2004, as the bank holding company changed its name to First Horizon, the capital markets group gained a new name as well: FTN Financial, one of the two major business divisions of First Horizon, the other being First Tennessee Bank itself. In 2007, FTN Financial took a bold step to open its first overseas office in Hong Kong. “Though Asia had always been an important segment of our business, we knew that Asian customers were growing in sophistication and needed a level of service that could only be obtained by being there,” said Steve Valadié, international markets manager for FTN Financial.

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

The challenges were many. There would be a new legal system and regulatory environment to navigate. The FTN Financial culture needed to be adapted to local employees. “It took a true team effort of experienced people, across all departments, to transfer the TennStar into Asia,” said Valadié.

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learly, the old bond division has come a long way. “Our sales reps are not just in Tennessee, they are all over the U.S. and beyond,” said Sally Pace, senior vice president of marketing and communications. “We regularly hold seminars across the country, because we go where our customers are. And we have resources like Chris Low, our chief economist, who was recognized by Bloomberg as the most accurate forecaster of Treasury note yields in 2012 and whose insight is routinely sought by stakeholders in all aspects of the financial industry. Our name recognition has become national.” Concurrent with the expansion of its geographic footprint and the broadening of its customer base, FTN Financial was also developing new products and services in response to listening

“It’s about developing a long-term relationship with our customers. We’re looking to make a difference by providing products and services that add value.” — mik e wa ddell 73

opposite page

Untitled

by dorothy sturm (1910-1988) Born in Memphis, Sturm studied at the Art Students League in New York. In 1935, she returned to Memphis, where she was one of the founding members of the Memphis Academy of Arts. The prolific artist worked in a wide variety of media including oils, textiles, and glass. r i g h t: A vintage stamp used to emboss bonds resembles a bull, the traditional symbol (along with the bear) of the financial markets.

to its customers. “Focusing on the needs of our customers has always been the culture embraced by First Tennessee,” said Mike Waddell, FTN Financial’s chief operating officer and CFO, who joined the firm in 2005. “To us, it’s really not about the transaction or the trade of the moment. It’s about developing a long-term relationship with our clients. We’re looking to make a difference by providing products and services that add value.” It started in the 1980s with the introduction of the Portfolio Strategies Group — a team of CPAs dedicated to helping depository customers with bond analysis and accounting. “Everybody sold the same bonds, right?” Gusmus explained. “To differentiate ourselves, we added a level of expertise so that people would rely on First Tennessee for their business.” The capital markets group brought in CPAs to consult with banks “to help them with their bond portfolios, to help them with their taxes, to help them with regulatory issues. In return for providing that service to those institutions, the banks would do

their bond business with us. They felt aligned with us.” Taking it a step further, FTN Financial began offering both portfolio accounting and analytical services in the late 1980s. This led years later to the development of an industry-leading customer web portal called myFTN. Steve Twersky, executive vice president and manager of Portfolio Strategies, joined FTN Financial in 1984 as a CPA in the Portfolio Strategies Group. “Today, we provide portfolio accounting services for about one in every seven banks in the United States,” said Twersky. “But that just scratches the surface of what we now provide on this web portal. Thousands of customers use the site each month to view reports, run what-if simulations on their portfolios, and access the full library of our publications. We’ve even added apps that allow customers to access myFTN on their smart devices.” Also in the late 1980s, FTN began to expand its product focus beyond fixed income securities, when it acquired a firm, known today as Capital Assets Corporation, which specializes in analyzing and trading loan portfolios and providing loan-related consulting services. This was followed by FTN Financial’s creation of an Asset/Liability Management group which later spawned a team providing interest rate derivative products for FTN’s customers. Along the way, FTN Financial Portfolio Advisors was established to provide investment portfolio management services to depository institutions that wanted to outsource this activity. This group has seen tremendous growth since its early beginnings, with clients in more than 30 states and having more than doubled in size over the past five years.

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ack in the 1960s, when George Lewis made that first sales call in Missouri, he probably got in his car, pulled out the road map, and drove to the next bank to show them a few bonds. While much has changed at FTN since those early days, one thing has stayed the same throughout the years. “Personal relationships still count,” said Kisber. “If you have a good relationship with a broker, you are going to call him, because you trust him. In the end, people still buy from people.” •

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First Tennessee Heritage Mural: Tennessee Flowers by ted faiers (1908-1985) Although best-known for his strong caricatures, Faiers was a talented artist who could portray the flora and fauna of Tennessee in vivid colors.

WORK CULTURE

cha pter ∂

Firstpower

Developed and refined over the years, a unique corporate culture drives First Tennessee forward.

8 ∂

ere’s a story from 1979 that will explain what makes us so different from other companies,” said Jim Vogel, executive vice president of FTN Financial. Vogel had started at First Tennessee in the late 1970s, initially working in the investor relations department before moving to the bank’s bond division. Then as now, the bank con-

ducted management training classes for newly hired employees, and at one of those sessions, bank chairman Ron Terry spoke to the group. “Somebody asked Ron what was the most important thing to know about

working at First Tennessee — what’s the best way for a new employee to become part of this organization,” recalled Vogel. “Ron thought about it a second, and then told them, ‘Every day that I work at the bank, I become a little less Ron Terry and a little more First Tennessee.’”

l e f t: The Firstpower Council bestows annual awards on employees or groups who meet the company’s core values of accountability, adaptability, integrity, and relationships.

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

a b o v e : A colorful billboard from the

1960s emphasized the comfort and convenience of banking at First National, even from your car.

Vogel laughed, remembering the shocked reaction to that comment. “That scared a lot of people — the chairman telling them that they were going to turn into the bank. But that idea — that you are the institution and the institution is you — well, you just won’t find that in a lot of other places.”

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any people are proud of the places they work, but the corporate culture at First Tennessee Bank is so strong, so pervasive on every level, that it’s actually been given a name: Firstpower. That pride is manifested in the company’s mission statement: “To be the best at serving our customers, one opportunity at a time.” It’s visible in the red, white, and blue “TennStar” logo displayed everywhere one looks, from the massive signs on the tops of the bank buildings throughout the region to the tiny lapel pins worn proudly by bank employees. And it manifests itself in the strong belief, told over and over

again by employees, that First Tennessee has a culture that is not only unique among banks, but stands apart from other companies throughout the region. Firstpower is a focus on quality, on always doing things the right way. While the “Firstpower” name given to the culture was coined in 1992, the foundation for a different type of culture was laid years earlier. In the mid-1980s, in a letter to shareholders, Ron Terry explained the new emphasis on quality and performance. “Since 1984,” he wrote, “we have been changing our corporate culture: We organized for quality, establishing a quality systems division at the corporate level and placing decision-makers closer to the customers they serve. We organized employee quality circles, and we trained more than 500 managers and supervisors in the concepts and practical applications of quality assurance. We began to understand that the cost of poor quality is much higher than the cost of doing the job right.” With that as a foundation, he concluded, “First Tennessee has risen from the point of recognizing quality as a way of doing business, to a plateau of accepting quality as the only way of doing business.” “Ron Terry was somewhat ahead of his time,” said John Daniel, the chief human resources officer today for First Horizon. “He understood that a corporate culture is something that needs to be managed consciously. Because if you don’t manage it in a conscious way, it manages you.” So the bank identifies Firstpower concepts to define the culture, said Daniel, “a set of ideas for employees that creates positive momentum. They then love the company, as an entity separate from their jobs, because it stands for something they can believe in.” A major element of the renewed focus on quality was the empowerment of employees to make their own decisions when it improved their job performance. And so Firstpower was officially established in 1992. “Firstpower represents an extension of our earlier efforts in quality management,” explained Terry, introducing the program. “Under this program, employees are professionally trained to look continuously for ways to improve our products and work processes. A critical element of the program is the employee’s ability to initiate changes when opportunities for improvement are identified.” Over the years, First Tennessee management had been vocal about proclaiming that its employees were its greatest asset, and the Firstpower culture became an established element of the bank’s workplace. “First Tennessee’s most distinguishable attribute is our em-

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ployees,” said Terry in the bank’s 1994 annual report. “As the pace of change in the banking industry has accelerated, our employees have risen to every challenge.” The Firstpower culture, he wrote, “promotes the principles and realities of employee empowerment, continuous improvement, and the ability to resolve work/ family issues.” Reflecting this new attitude, the bank instituted a new employee suggestion system, and the response was remarkable. Working as teams, some 2,000 employees submitted more than 500 ideas during the initial phase of this program. Terry Lee joined First Tennessee in 1986 as manager of corporate communications after stints with WMC-TV, Memphis magazine, and Methodist Hospitals. “I remember sitting down with Ron and thinking through the whole Firstpower concept,” he said, “how important it could be to the organization. We realized how it could differentiate us, not only in the community but by making our employees feel more loyal, and want to stay with us.” In a time when people seemed to change jobs every few years, First Tennessee understood the value of retaining good employees. “Research had shown us that our customers who had been with us the longest were our most profitable customers,” said Kim Cherry, executive vice president for corporate communications for First Horizon, the bank’s holding company. “And then what we found was that our long-time customers tended to do business with our longer-tenured employees. So we wanted to build a culture that created a place where talented people would want to come to work and stay for a very long time.” When Ralph Horn took over as First Tennessee chairman and CEO in the late 1990s, he also embraced the Firstpower concept, calling it “an intangible that gives us a distinct competitive advantage.” Horn explained that, in its most basic form, “it is simply the way we do business. Firstpower is a culture so vital to our ability to continue as an independent company that it is embraced throughout the company in a way that has produced some remarkable distinctions.” Among them, he noted at the time, “It’s the reason we’re one of the most profitable bank holding companies in the nation, and at the same time received top honors from Businessweek magazine as one of the most family-friendly companies in America. It’s the reason we have some of the highest marks in the industry related to employee and customer retention. And it’s the reason we have become the employer of choice in our markets.” In conclusion, as Horn noted in the company’s 1998 annual report, “Firstpower is that unique ingredient which inspires us to stay focused on those attributes that build value for our employees, customers, shareholders, and communities.”

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oday, “the corporate culture here is extremely strong,” said William Losch, First Horizon’s chief financial officer, who worked at several larger banks in North Carolina before joining First Tennessee’s parent company in 2007. “In fact, it’s the strongest culture that I’ve ever been a part of. Over the past few years, we’ve had to do a lot of things that weren’t particularly fun because of the economic environment we found ourselves in, but the resiliency and the adaptation of that culture has been unbelievable.” An advantage of what Losch calls a “strong, embedded culture” is the ability to “transform the things that needed to transform, while keeping the strongest things that made us special in the first place.” We “really open the channels of communications — both down through the organization and then back up through the organization,” he said. As examples, he cited the “CEO Update” that goes out via email to all employees on a regular basis from First Horizon Chairman Bryan Jordan. Shortly after Jordan sends those emails, it’s not uncommon for more than a few employees to reply directly with ideas,

a b o v e : First Tennessee has always

placed a strong emphasis on the satisfaction of its employees.

“Firstpower is that unique ingredient that allows us to stay focused on those attributes that build value for our employees, customers, shareholders, and communities.” — r a lph hor n 81

“We’re big enough so we can offer our customers great technology, but we’re still small enough so we know our fellow employees’ names, and that’s what makes this such a great company.” — susa n springfield

concerns, questions, and words of encouragement for their top executive. There aren’t many companies today where employees feel comfortable emailing a CEO directly, especially with their concerns. But Jordan welcomes the feedback. And he’s equally committed to meeting with employees face to face, both one on one and in town hall meetings where executives travel to various parts of the state to meet with groups of employees to just see how things are going. Born in Wheeling, West Virginia, Bruce Hopkins came to Memphis when his father took a job on Presidents Island. Now president of First Tennessee’s West Tennessee region, he remembered when several bank executives visited Japan “to look at companies over there who had really embraced the culture of quality.” One of the things they discovered was the emphasis on service, which the bank adopted — “making clients feel that, hey, we’re going to take care of you from start to finish, and you’re going to be a First Tennessee customer for life.” Hopkins noted that the bank wants every manager to understand that it’s more than a job. “They are an owner in this company. They have a vested interest in making sure that what they are doing for this company is like they were running their own business.”

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irstpower is immediately obvious to employees who have experience with other companies. Susan Springfield, First Horizon’s executive vice president and chief credit officer, worked at larger banks in North Carolina before moving to Memphis. She quickly noticed First Tennessee’s emphasis on people. “We’re a big enough bank so we can offer our customers great technology,” she said, “but we’re still small enough so we know our fellow employees’ names, and that’s what makes this such a great company — being able to say to our customers, ‘Lisa is in charge of this,’ or ‘Michael is in charge of that.’ Having a real name makes you feel like you have more influence.” Another key aspect of the bank’s culture is diversity. “It’s not just men and women,” she says, “but about experience, too. We’re known as a bank that serves all areas of the community and hires from all areas of the community.” For a while, Springfield said, First Tennessee was even known as the “blue collar bank” because “we hired what you’d call up-and-comers, sometimes the first person in that family to go to college, for example. Many of our retired executives fall into that category.” To Memphis sports fans, Herb Hilliard may be remembered as the first African-American basketball player at Memphis State

University, playing for the Tigers in the mid-1960s. After college, he met Ron Terry, who hired him to work at the Lamar-Airways branch in Memphis. “I told Ron later,” Hilliard laughed, “that was probably the only mistake he made in his entire career.” After a year or so, Hilliard was named manager of the Lamar-Airways branch — one of the first African-American public bank managers in Memphis, if not the entire Mid-South. “For a black man like me to come into an organization in the 1960s and rise to the executive ranks,” Hilliard said, “you didn’t find that very much — even around the entire country.” He remembered he’d only been manager three days when a customer called Terry and complained, “If I was going to run this branch, then he was going to close his account. And Ron said, ‘Well, I guess you’d better move your account then.’” That commitment to diversity continues today. Shortly after Jordan was named CEO, “inclusion” became one of the Firstpower concepts, along with “candor,” “change,” and “teamwork.” At First Tennessee, inclusion means an intentional level playing field that allows any high performer to succeed.

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avid Popwell already knew two things about First Tennessee’s culture before he joined the bank. “First of all, the bankers here are relationship-oriented. We’re not just transaction-oriented,” said Popwell, named bank president in 2007 after stints with a law firm and another bank in Memphis. “I saw that when I competed with First Tennessee. If you called on a customer, First Tennessee didn’t just handle their loan, they had provided all kinds of products. It was an all-in approach to relationship banking.” And second, Popwell continued, “I knew that First Tennessee had good people and good leadership close to the customer, who were given the opportunity to make decisions. Coming from a competitor, I could see that First Tennessee could get a transaction or relationship approved much faster. If it took [another bank] 10 days, First Tennessee could do it in two. That’s because you have good people on the front line who know what they are doing and know what the company is willing to do.” Popwell saw evidence that the First Tennessee culture was still yielding the desired results decades later. Not only did the bank have one of the highest customer retention rates in the country, but also: “We have a lot of long-tenured employees. In our financial centers today, tellers average seven years, FSRs [financial services representatives] average seven years, and branch managers 12 years. That’s unheard of in this business.” One of those employees is Betty Bradbury, the relationship

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left

Historic Encounter Between E.H. Crump and W.C. Handy on Beale Street, 1964

by carroll cloar (1913-1993) Cloar was a master at portraying surreal and imaginary scenes. It’s possible Crump met Handy one day on Beale Street, but it’s unlikely that encounter included so many other well-known Memphians.

manager at First Tennessee in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. The bank’s longest-tenured employee as the company celebrates its 150th anniversary, Bradbury joined the company in 1966 as a retail banking manager. In a career spanning almost 50 years, she has recognized the value the bank placed on building strong ties with its customers. “I had a lady who came into the bank a few weeks ago,” Bradbury said. “I hadn’t seen her in years, but she came up to me and said, ‘You financed my first Cadillac in 1987.’ I said to her, ‘Miss Wallace, I bet you’re here to get a loan for another one,’ and she said, ‘Oh no. I can pay cash for one now!’”

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ryan Jordan, who was named CEO of First Horizon in 2008, recognized both the value and the challenge of the Firstpower culture. “In my early days here, I knew it was a very strong culture,” he said. “You could feel the pride

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

and the legacy in the organization.” At the same time, a company’s culture shouldn’t be static, and Jordan realized it needed to change, to be able to adapt to a quickly changing economic environment. “So we invested a tremendous amount of time and money in trying to strengthen the ability to communicate,” he said. “Sometimes leaders can get disconnected from what’s really happening. If you think about organizations, in some ways they are designed to keep problems from landing on an executive’s desk. You have to listen hard. You have to communicate a lot, which is very important to me.” The Firstpower Council is an important part of how the culture is shaped. Before Jordan became CEO, the group was made up solely of executives, with the idea that leadership from the top was necessary for the culture to thrive throughout the company. Because of the well-established strength of the culture today and the value he places on communication, Jordan changed the makeup of the Firstpower Council. Today it includes 16 em-

ployees who represent the diversity of the company, reflecting standard measures of diversity as well as tenure, business unit, and location. John Daniel explained, “Their job is to provide advice and input to management as to how we can manage the culture and the business itself more effectively.” Communication goes two ways at the Firstpower Council meetings. “We ask questions, they talk, and we listen,” said Daniel. “They tell us how they feel, what it’s like to work here, what they like about what’s going on, and what they are concerned about.” Recognizing the contributions of employees is an important element of First Tennessee’s culture. Every quarter, the bank bestows its Firstpower Awards, selected by the Firstpower Council from recommendations from employees, to any individual or group that best represents the company’s core values: accountability, adaptability, integrity, and relationships.

a b o v e : Fortune magazine was

just one of many national groups and publications to recognize the special culture of First Tennessee.

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he benefit s of the F ir stpow er culture at First Tennessee have been recognized and embraced outside the bank. In 1995, Working Mother magazine ranked First Tennessee in its list of the top 100 companies for working mothers — the only Tennessee-based company recognized for workplace innovations that allowed working mothers — at a time when women made up almost 75 percent of the firm’s workforce — to spend more time with their families. The article noted the firm’s opportunity for advancement, child-care assistance, flexible work arrangements, work/life support such as family counseling, and other “family-friendly” benefits. The following year, Businessweek magazine named First Tennessee the number one family-friendly company in America. In that report, the bank was ranked ahead of nationally renowned companies, such as Motorola, DuPont, Eddie Bauer, and Hewlett Packard. That recognition of the First Tennessee culture continued. The bank acknowledged that Firstpower had been the catalyst for honors that in recent years have included: ◗◗ American Banker named First Tennessee the best bank with

assets of at least $10 million to work for in the country (2013). ◗◗ Fortune magazine named First Tennessee to its list of the 100 best companies to work for in America (1998-2007). ◗◗ The Association of Fundraising Professionals named First Tennessee the Outstanding Corporation of the Year in 1998 and the First Tennessee Foundation the Outstanding Foundation of the Year in 2010. ◗◗ Business Ethics magazine listed First Tennessee as one of its “100 Best Corporate Citizens,” noting that “the cutting-edge practices of these firms offer model business strategies in good corporate citizenship” (2003-2006). ◗◗ AARP listed the bank as one of the “Best Employers for Workers over 50,” a select group that included only 25 companies across America (2003-2012). ◗◗ First Tennessee Bank made the InformationWeek 500 list “as one of the most innovative users of technology” (2010-2013) ◗◗ CIO magazine selected First Tennessee as a “Top 100 Company To Excel in the 21st Century” (1999). ◗◗ The Chattanooga Times Free Press readers poll gave top honors to First Tennessee as Best Bank, Best Customer Service, and Best Place to Work (2010). ◗◗ The Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption said that First Tennessee was one of the “100 Best Adoption Friendly Workplaces in America” (2009-2013) ◗◗ The National Association for Female Executives named First Tennessee one of the “Top 50 Companies for Executive Women” (2009, 2012, 2013). ◗◗ Training magazine named First Horizon to the “Training Top 125” (2010-2014). ◗◗ Consumer Reports magazine even gave a nod to the bank’s Visa card, calling it “One of the 10 Most Consumer Friendly” (2005). ◗◗ Best Companies Group, publishers of BusinessTN magazine, named First Horizon National Corporation one of the state’s 20 best places to work (2010). Many of these weren’t just one-time honors. First Tennessee has earned a place on Working Mother magazine’s list of best employers every year since the list’s inception in 1995. The bank has made the AARP’s list of best employers every year since 2003. The Dave Thomas Foundation has recognized the bank every year since 2009. In addition, Fortune magazine inducted First Tennessee into

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its hall of Fame for earning a spot on its coveted list of the “100 Best Companies to Work For” since the list’s inception in 1998 — one of only 18 companies to do so. “i think we’re just family-friendly,” said susan springfield, executive vice president and chief credit officer. “Through the years, First tennessee has always had a good focus on work/life balance, and that was even before you heard about it nationally. That’s part of our culture, and it’s on every level. You end up with employees who are thankful for that.” And there has always been a special emphasis on the role of women in the First tennessee workforce, as reflected in the recognition from Working Mother magazine. Among the bank’s many employee resource groups is the First tennessee Women’s initiative. “That’s been around now for more than 15 years,” said springfield, who was one of the group’s founders, “and it’s all about empowering women in our company, and in our community, to help them achieve success.” As a result of these endeavors and other aspects of the bank’s culture, the national Association of Female executives continues to name First horizon one of the top 50 companies in America for executive women. “That’s a national award, and we were the smallest company listed,” said springfield. “When i heard the size of some of the other employers, to be recognized like that was phenomenal.” The many awards and honors also convey the benefits of employment at First tennessee. “We have a really great culture, and it becomes an employment brand,” said Daniel, who held human-resources positions at other banks in Pittsburgh and Memphis before joining First tennessee. “These types of recognition are a way of communicating to the world that we are a great place to work.”

THE Fir ST TEN NESSEE STOry

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or Charles tuggle, the bank’s general counsel, the Firstpower culture is “a core part of how we operate.” Before joining First horizon, tuggle was CeO of the Baker Donelson law firm, another nationally recognized employer of choice, which has offices in First tennessee’s corporate headquarters building in Memphis. tuggle said, “First tennessee has a longstanding reputation for being a company with integrity, one that tries to do the right thing.” That commitment to integrity is echoed by steve hawkins, executive vice president of corporate and commercial banking, who has been with First tennessee for more than 35 years. “We try to make sure we’re always doing the right thing for our customers, for our communities, for our employees, and for our shareholders,” he said. “That’s why i’ll always think of First tennessee as being a good place to work — even a wholesome place to work.” Firstpower has an even deeper significance for Dave Miller, executive vice president in charge of consumer banking, who joined the bank in 1994 after earning a degree in physical sciences from harvard. “They say the healthiest people are the ones who wake up and realize they have a purpose in life,” he said. “Well, i care deeply about the people here, but i also care about what we do. it’s highly noble if you think about helping people save money or finance education. But then the way this bank approaches doing business, and the part it plays in the community — it has almost a spiritual side to it.” •

“We have a great culture, and it becomes an employment brand. These types of recognition are a way of communicating to the world that we are a great place to work.” — john da niel

l e f t: in 2010 Jim Blasingame, manager of bank operations, was presented the fi rst Charles Q. Harris Leadership Award, the bank’s highest honor. Other recipients have been Steve Hawkins, executive vice president of corporate and commercial banking (2011); Susan Springfield, chief credit officer (2012); and Amy Shreve (2013), director of consumer credit.

right

First Tennessee Heritage Mural: Grand Ole Opry by ted faiers (1908-1985) Founded in 1925 as a one-hour radio show, the Grand Ole Opry evolved into a world-famous showcase for country music. Faiers’ panel captures the early days, when banjos, fiddles, and dulcimers ruled the stage of the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville.

The war years had been difficult times for the bank, but by 1945, First National President Norfleet Turner announced, “The year 1946 can be faced with confidence and optimism.”

GOOD NEIGHBO

cha pter ∂

Getting Involved 9 ∂

For First Tennessee, being a good bank goes hand-in-hand with being a good neighbor.

ny story about First Tennessee’s strong commitment to its community must go back to the very early days. In 1864, as Memphis’ first and only truly national bank, the firm was selected by the U.S. government to distribute salary payments to the Union troops stationed in the former Confederate city. A few years later, when yellow fever

had decimated the region during the summer of 1878, First National handled relief funds donated from sympathetic citizens of other cities. It did the same when the

Mississippi River flooded millions of acres of farmland, sweeping families from their homes during the great floods of 1927 and 1937. During World War II, though government censorship prohibited any specific listing of companies, in its annual report First National Bank announced, “We have participated to a large extent in the financing of firms engaged in the manufacture of war materials, as well

l e f t: As a direct reflection of its Firstpower culture, First Tennessee employees began to embark on civic ventures that extended beyond the traditional world of banking.

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r i g h t: During World War II, First National Bank sold more than $9 million of war bonds and set up a branch at Memphis Municipal Airport to serve soldiers there.

a b o v e a nd O p p o s i t e : The Memphis

headquarters building reflects the beauty of the holiday season.

“Through a year-round contribution of personnel, money, time, and influence, [First Tennessee] actively supports those projects which make for a better city and a happier community in which to live.”

as making direct loans to our customers who obtained war contracts.” First National sold more than $9 million of war bonds, charging no fees for these transactions, and by the end of the war had cashed more than 85,000 Series E bonds. At the request of the U.S. War Department, the bank established a special branch at Memphis Municipal Airport to serve the banking needs of soldiers and civilians stationed there. Dozens of top officers, such as vice president (later chairman) Allen Morgan Sr., temporarily left the bank to join the armed forces. Five of those employees made the ultimate sacrifice, killed in duty in the service of their country. These had been difficult times for the country, the city, and the bank, but with the war’s end in 1945, First National President Norfleet Turner announced, “The year 1946 can be faced with confidence and optimism.” In an annual report from the 1950s, Turner acknowledged that “the public is becoming accustomed to having all types of services brought to it.” As a result, he pledged “a determination to render the best service possible to our customers, this community, and the broad area served by Memphis.” The bank had

already begun to open other branches throughout the city, but during this time it also embarked on civic ventures that extended beyond the world of banking. The bank’s 1955 annual report summarized just some of those ventures, large and small: helping with fund-raisers, serving on boards, speaking before civic groups, and more. “First National’s officers have also contributed generously of both time and money in promoting greater interest in major sports and cultural advancements. Some of their activities in this field include the securing of tickets and hotel reservations for outof-town visitors, the display in our banking lobby of the work of various local artists and students, the giving of book reviews before cultural groups.” A special civic contribution was the new Community Service Room in the basement of the Poplar Plaza branch, which hosted some 275 different organizations during its first year. First National began a Christmas Club service, a special savings plan that attracted almost 4,000 members. And in 1954, the bank brought to Memphis a traveling exhibit, “Industrial Progress, U.S.A.,” established by the Henry Ford Museum and Greenfield Village. Bank officials announced that “thousands of children of high school and junior high school grades were able to view this educational and entertaining display.” Some of the bank’s civic efforts were behind the scenes. First National installed a telephone/tape recording device called an “Audicron,” which gave the correct time to anyone who called in; those callers also heard a brief promotional message about First National’s services. The Audicron proved so popular that Southern Bell added 48 phone lines to handle the incoming calls — more than 55,000 a day, or some 20 million during the first year alone. Almost from the day it opened, First National recognized the importance of its civic obligations. “Through a year-round contribution of personnel, money, time, and influence, it actively supports those projects which make for a better city and a happier community in which to live,” according to the firm’s annual report. “All of the bank’s 54 officers and many of its employees give generously of their time, both during and after banking hours, to cooperate in such enterprises.” Working closely with the local chamber of commerce, First National spent substantial funds promoting Memphis as a place to do business. “Through a program of national and sectional advertising in many financial and business publications, it has been instrumental in bringing to this city a number of branch manufacturing or distributing plants and retail outlets, contributing to the city’s continued growth and prosperity.”

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ome of First National Bank’s civic projects affected citizens for only a few hours; others left a lifelong impact. During the summer of 1968, for example, the bank sponsored “The Puppet People,” a marionette show tailored for “the less fortunate children of Memphis and Shelby County” that journeyed to Memphis parks and playgrounds in a bright yellow truck. During this same period, Norfleet Turner, honorary chairman of the board, headed a project called “Operation Breakthrough.” Working in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the bank arranged special financing for the construction of more than 260 homes for low-income families throughout Memphis. When Ron Terry assumed the presidency of the newly named First Tennessee Bank in 1971, he placed even more emphasis on community engagement. Bank officials took key positions with the chamber of commerce and served on the boards of local industries, universities, and other institutions. It was also Terry who, in 1980, helped conceive and served as chairman of the first Memphis Jobs Conference, a yearlong series of “town hall” meetings. Designed to help the city establish specific priorities for economic growth, this event also involved many bank employees, who did much of the day-to-day work arranging the various seminars. Also in 1980, First Tennessee presented its first annual Bravo Awards, inspired by the slogan, “Big ideas are made possible by those big enough to believe.” With applications screened by a panel of community judges, grants as large as $100,000 were presented to local artists and performing-arts groups. The bank’s contributions were recognized by Forbes magazine, which presented First National with its 1980 “Business in the Arts” award. “We now call them the ArtsFirst grants,” said Kim Cherry, executive vice president for corporate communications, “but the idea of using our community investment dollars to recognize excellence in the arts continues today.” And it was also during this period that First Tennessee, working with curator Alice Bingham Gorman, began to assemble its highly acclaimed First Tennessee Heritage

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

are intimately involved in the world beyond their workplace,” said Ron Terry. “They are helping educators build better public schools. They are working with chambers of commerce to promote economic development. They are supporting the arts. They are producing community festivals and special events. They are raising money for a United Way campaign, running for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, walking for the March of Dimes, or manning the telephones at a local crisis center.” In short, “They are making Tennessee an even better place to be — for people and for business.”

a b o v e : Over the years, First Tennessee

Bank has placed special emphasis on financial literacy programs.

OPPOSITE

Sam Houston’s School in Maryville

by biff elrod (1946- ) Although he is best known as the governor of Texas, Houston spent his early days in Tennessee. Though a man of limited formal education, at the age of 19 he established a oneroom schoolhouse near Maryville, which historians now consider the first public school in Tennessee.

Collection (discussed in Chapter One). In 1986, First Tennessee became actively involved with Homecoming ’86, the state’s tourism and economic development campaign. The bank contributed $500,000, with the funds used to finance projects “that showcase what is special and unique in Tennessee — projects expected to draw thousands of visitors and expatriated sons and daughters back to Tennessee to celebrate the riches of its heritage.” Among those projects was the photography and production of some 400,000 postcards featuring Tennessee landmarks. These were given free to bank customers, who used them as invitations to Homecoming ’86 events. The bank also produced a multimedia exhibition, “Tennessee Celebrates!” which toured the state throughout 1986, “depicting the color and excitement of the myriad ways Tennesseans celebrate their history and holidays, their community and family traditions, all the things that make them special.” By the end of the 1980s, First Tennessee had established its own in-house volunteer program, which matched the interests of employees with the needs of local organizations. As a result of this continued emphasis on civic involvement, “our people

ontinuing its in volv ement w ith loc al education, in the early 1990s First Tennessee offered its acclaimed “Lesson Line.” “One of the significant keys to a young person’s education is the amount of parental involvement they receive,” said Terry Lee, the bank’s former manager of corporate communications. “This was before personal computers, so we set up a system where a parent could call in and hear a personalized message from their child’s teacher — information about homework assignments, field trips, even messages for a specific parent for a specific class.” The program definitely earned an A+. In use by more than 700 schools, by its second year it had logged more than four million calls from parents throughout Tennessee. “Lesson Line was one of those classic examples of strategically thinking about your community investment,” said Kim Cherry. “It’s asking: what’s good for our business and what’s good for our community, and then how can we marry those, with our resources?”

n 19 93 c a m e on e of t h e l a rge s t a n d mo s t comprehensive community programs in the history of any Memphis company. The First Tennessee Foundation was established as a private, charitable entity designed to “engage our employees, respond inclusively to needs, and promote progress throughout Tennessee.” Within a few years the foundation became a major contributor to all facets of life in Tennessee and played a key role in the Firstpower culture that makes the bank unique. The First Tennessee Foundation donates some $5 million every year to meet community needs in four specific areas: ◗◗ Education: To plant the seeds of success, First Tennessee volunteers provide tutoring and other services to students as well as teachers, with a special emphasis on financial literacy.

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“Part of the culture of First Tennessee — if you’re a manager or an employee — is to be involved in your community. We’ve always expected that because our communities make us what we are.” — cha rles burk ett

r i g h t: First Tennessee has been a long-time supporter of sports teams and organizations throughout the state.

◗ Economic Development: The First tennessee Foundation supports local chambers of commerce, regional development initiatives, and small business resources. ◗ Health and Human Services: First tennessee employees have donated millions of dollars to United Way, making the bank one of the largest contributors in the state. First tennessee also provides support to hospitals and other healthcare organizations across tennessee. ◗ Arts and Culture: A longtime supporter of the arts, First tennessee provides funding for artists, museums, and other cultural institutions. “i’ve been at the bank my entire career, more than 40 years,” said Charles Burkett, currently the chairman of the First tennessee Foundation. “Part of the culture of First tennessee — if you’re a manager, or if you’re an employee — is to be involved in your community. We’ve always expected that because those communities make us what we are.” in his early years with First national and First tennessee, Burkett served as manager of the bank in Cookeville, tennessee. That was just his day job. As part of the First tennessee mission, he served on the boards of the town’s chamber of commerce, the United Way campaign, and even local blood drives. “i’m not tooting my own horn, because this really applies to anybody here,” said Burkett, “but in later years i’ve been chairman of the American Cancer society, chairman of the red Cross, chairman of the chamber of commerce, and chairman of the University of Memphis board. Those are just the types of things we do, that are important to the community, and they are important to the company, because that’s our name out there. That’s our brand, and that’s who we are.” herb hilliard, former executive vice president and chief government relations officer, remembered his very first day at the bank, “working a desk in a branch” in Memphis. “The first thing they told me was, ‘We support our

community.’” in his 43-year career with First tennessee, hilliard served on the boards of such diverse organizations as the Memphis and shelby County Airport Authority, the Memphis Park Commission, the Memphis Port Authority, the University of Memphis Alumni Association, the riverfront Development Commission, and the United Way. he is currently chairman of the board of the national Civil rights Museum. “We’re talking about a lot of time investment from our employees,” said Cherry. “it’s asking a lot. When Charles [Burkett] was bank manager in Cookeville, he didn’t just go to work and think, ‘i’ve got to make a loan today, or i’ve got to earn deposit business.’ it’s fulfilling and rewarding, but community involvement is also complex and challenging. even so, one of the reasons the community is so tied into our culture is because we have people like Charles and herb and others who are willing to do it.” And again, it’s much more than just writing checks to groups who need money. “The majority of the organizations that our foundation supports also have some involvement from an employee perspective,” said Cherry. “For instance, an employee chairs the Junior Achievement board, and the First tennessee Foundation is a long-time supporter of Junior Achievement. We’re there holding that organization accountable.” The foundation considers many factors before making any contributions. “it’s going to be based on, are they doing things in the community that they said they are going to do,” said Burkett. “Are they meeting those needs? Are those needs growing? Are they making the community better? Are they efficient in how they do it? Do they spend their money wisely? Are they good financial stewards? We look at all those things.” “And we really decide where to focus our giving,” explained Cherry. “Valvoline might sponsor nAsCAr events, but programs that focus on financial literacy are a logical connection to a bank. The arts are also strategic, as well as economic development programs.” First tennessee, for example, funded a

T HE F ir ST 150

program called Smart Tennessee, which teaches young adults such basic skills as how to write checks or balance a checkbook. “It’s a program sponsored by the state, but the state didn’t fund it completely,” said Burkett. “It teaches financial literacy from kindergarten through the sixth grade, and it wouldn’t exist unless they got private dollars from foundations like ours.”

irst Tennessee’s civic engagement doesn’t stop in Memphis. The Firstpower emphasis on the community stretches across the state, and beyond. “We take the volunteer spirit much farther than just being the official bank of the University of Tennessee Volunteers,” said Pam Fansler, president of the East Tennessee region. Fansler oversees banks in a region that includes Knoxville and Chattanooga. More than just bank branches, her region includes the bank’s main data center in Maryville and the FirstLink customer service center in Knoxville. “We may not have the 150-year presence that First Tennessee has in Memphis,” she said, “but people here very much consider First Tennessee their hometown bank, and we are very committed to giving back to that community.” In addition to being one of that region’s largest contributors to the United Way campaign, in East Tennessee the bank is the official sponsor of the UT Vols, both the men’s teams and the Lady Vols. First Tennessee’s “TennStar” logo has a prominent placement atop the tallest building in downtown Knoxville and on the scoreboards at Neyland Stadium and Thompson-Boling Arena on the UT campus. “I would put our community involvement up there with any company in East Tennessee,” said Fansler. “There are other companies that have the ability to give more financially than we do, but at the grassroots level — whether that’s serving on a hospital board or volunteering as a troop leader for the Girl Scouts — I think we pretty much cover the landscape.” Doyle Rippee, president of the Middle Tennessee region, gives a similar account of his region, which includes some 70 branches in five counties surrounding Nashville.

T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

“Are we an icon in the community like First Tennessee in Memphis?” he asked. “No, because we’re just not as big here. But we are still very active here. We have a very active United Way campaign, and we have sponsored major exhibitions at Cheekwood [Botanical Garden and Museum of Art] and the Frist [Center for the Visual Arts].” In addition, Rippee has been involved with the chamber of commerce, the Land Trust of Tennessee, and the advisory committee for Nashville’s St. Thomas Hospital. “We don’t yet have the same presence here as Memphis,” Rippee said, noting that First Tennessee moved into his region in the 1970s, “so we have to work a little harder, have to be a bit more scrappy at times, but by and large we share the same culture.” Also sharing the First Tennessee

a b o v e : Year after year, First Tennessee

employees rank among the major contributors to the United Way.

culture is the newly formed Mid-Atlantic region. “We have developed, embraced, and employ what we think to be a wellbalanced plan of civic and community engagement,” said John Fox, market president of the Mid-Atlantic region. “it takes full advantage of the ongoing generosity of the First tennessee Foundation, supporting wonderful nonprofit entities that serve our communities.”

a b o v e : For the Dragon Boat races in Memphis,

e have a long and proud history,” said tommy Adams, treasurer and executive vice president, who joined First tennessee more than 30 years ago after stints at another Memphis bank and the Continental Grain Company. “We’re viewed very favorably in all the counties where we operate as having done a lot of good things. We’ve helped people start businesses, or build their businesses. Through the First tennessee Foundation and other ways, we’ve been a great corporate citizen. And despite any challenges we may encounter, i think that proud history will continue.” talking about the bank’s civic engagement, David Popwell said, “You know what’s really interesting is we don’t go looking for credit for what we’re doing.” Popwell, president of banking for First horizon, had worked at another major bank and a Memphis law firm before joining First tennessee as chief operating officer in 2007. “in a lot of organizations, what you do in the community is part of your marketing plan. What we do in our communities is part of our mission.” •

the bank fielded a money-themed boat. r i g h t: Community support stretches across

the state, including sponsorship of races at the Bristol Motor Speedway (the nice model car was a giveaway).

T HE F ir ST 150

“In a lot of organizations, what you do in the community is part of your marketing plan. What we do in our communities is part of our mission.” — david popw ell

left

The Fossil Wing in Tennarkippi’s Plumbago Hall

by dolph smith (1934- ) Smith studied at the Memphis Academy of Arts and later served as a professor at Memphis College of Art before “retiring” to Ripley, Tennessee. There he has created books, paintings, and elaborate multimedia pieces, such as the work shown here, celebrating the fictional world of “Tennarkippi.” THE Fir ST TEN NESSEE STOry

right

Regatta

by adele lemm (1904-1977) Born in Wisconsin, Lemm studied art in Memphis at the old Siena College (now the site of First Tennessee’s Ron Terry Center) and then taught for 23 years at the Memphis Academy of Arts. Her often abstract works are known for their bold spashes of color.

“All of us wish we could crystal-ball it and look down the road. Right now, changes are coming so fast that I don’t know if anybody can really tell you that this is definitely how banking is going to look even five or 10 years from now.” — steve haw k ins 98

THE FUTURE

cha pter ∂

The Next 150

What changes are over the horizon for First Tennessee?

10 ∂

t First tennessee’s bank operations center in Memphis, Prescott moves quickly and silently down the corridors, pausing briefly to turn down aisles and stop before certain cubicles, where the center’s 700 employees pick up trays of the checks, statements, and deposits they are processing.

But on this day, there’s a rare glitch in the normally smooth-running delivery

system. Without any warning — without even making a sound, really — Prescott turns and smacks into a cubicle wall. it’s not Prescott’s fault. it seems one of the bank employees had rearranged the walls of his cubicle, and Prescott hadn’t been told about it. As you may have gathered by now, Prescott isn’t a person. instead, “he” is a machine, a wheeled electric trolley about the size of r2D2 from Star Wars, programmed remotely. instead of gliding on rails, this technological

l e f t: Even as technology changes the future of banking, many experts believe people will continue to play a vital role, even if the primary contact is by telephone at call centers.

THE Fir ST TEN NESSEE STOry

r i g h t: First came the internet, offering online banking. Now smartphone apps and other devices are dramatically changing how, when, and where customers bank.

101

a b o v e : A push of a button, and another

check is deposited. Why visit a branch when a phone does the job? That’s the question facing bankers today.

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marvel trundles along wires buried in the floor, picking up signals that tell it where to go, where to turn, where to stop. It’s an excellent system — quiet, efficient, and uncomplaining — until somebody moves his cubicle wall into Prescott’s path. Welcome to the future at First Tennessee Bank. In business more than 150 years (and counting), the firm has always embraced the latest technology, from the 1970s with ATM machines to the present day “apps” that allow customers to bank from the convenience of — well, anywhere and everywhere they happen to be — to robots like Prescott (named after the street address of the bank ops center) delivering mail and packages around the 170,000-square-foot complex all day long. But with this new technology comes a challenge. The essence of the bank’s unique Firstpower culture depends on building and maintaining strong and lasting personal relationships, with customers as well as co-workers. Much new technology, it seems, is designed to eliminate the human element entirely. How to balance those two components is a challenge facing the bank as it approaches its next 150 years. So the question is: What’s ahead for First Tennessee? What is the future of the company, and the banking industry as a whole?

oy, all of us wish we could crystal-ball it and look down the road,” said Steve Hawkins, executive vice president of commercial and corporate banking. “Right now changes are coming so fast that I don’t know if anybody can really tell you that this is definitely how banking is going to look even five to 10 years from now.” In 2013, First Tennessee converted one of its branches in Germantown, Tennessee, into a “concierge” bank. Instead of facing a long row of tellers perched behind a tall counter, when they walk in the door customers enter a welcoming environment, with a personal greeting from a “universal” banker. It’s a more personal, comfortable approach to banking. Hawkins envisions taking that concept a step further, with universal bankers at all the branches. “They would meet you when you come in,” he said. “If you want to make a deposit, they’ll help with that. If you need a car loan, they’ll sit down with you and talk about that. And if you need an appointment to talk with a private client advisor, they’ll handle that. It will be an interesting concept.” Whether it’s a personal greeter or a banker that customers have worked with for years, “there is still great importance in sitting down and looking someone in the eye when you’re talking about financial relationships,” said Hawkins. “People will always play a vital role,” said David Popwell, First Tennessee Bank president. “We have to continue to develop good people, because when you look at the brand behind the words ‘First Tennessee,’ it’s not about this building, or the sign. It’s the people here.” As manager of bank operations, Jim Blasingame is in charge of all the behind-the-scenes work most customers never see: processing of deposits, payments, statements, and dozens of other activities. And yes, his job includes overseeing “employees” like Prescott. But though his group doesn’t meet many outside customers, he too understands the importance that people play in banking relationships, and he knows what needs to be done to continue the successes of the past. “Because there will be fewer branches and fewer people coming into our branches, we have to improve our call center efforts,” he said, referring to the bank’s FirstLink operation in Knoxville. “The call center is going to become even more important as we move forward, because years from now it may be the only contact the bank has with a customer over many months. And it may not be face-to-face, but it’s still person-to-person.” Sally Pace echoes the sentiment that people — one way or another — will always play a role. As senior vice president of

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marketing and communications for FTN Financial, one of her jobs is to organize in-person seminars and online “webinars” for clients. “When you talk about technology and the future, I don’t think our webinars will ever replace our seminars,” Pace said. “Going online for a webinar will never replace somebody getting to sit down with Jim Vogel,” referring to FTN Financial’s executive vice president. “It’s sort of like watching George Clooney or Catherine Zeta Jones on TV versus getting to see them in person. I mean, I’m not comparing Jim Vogel to George Clooney, but in some circles he is actually that important. “Money is very personal,” she continued, “whether it’s your money or your company’s money. And if it’s my money I want to sit down with somebody, person to person, and hear him speak and then be able to ask him questions. Technology can never replace that.” A view of FTN Financial’s trading floor, with hundreds of computers delivering real-time information to the company’s traders and sales force, shows the role that technology plays in their business. “But I don’t really care what the technology does,” said Michael Kisber, president of FTN Financial. “Yes, it allows us to do more, and it allows us to remain competitive. But I don’t care if it lets us zoom a bond into outer space. In the end, people buy from people.”

irst Tennessee put an official name to its Mid-Atlantic region in 2013, combining six banks in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Florida. The banks currently focus on corporate and commercial banking, commercial real estate, finance for commercial developers, and private banking. They are in the process of developing full-branch status, and when that happens, they will most likely employ a concept similar to the “universal banker” mentioned earlier by Steve Hawkins. “You won’t see a traditional teller line,” said John Fox, market president of the Mid-Atlantic region. “We will employ the concept of universal bankers, so a banker will serve as a paying and receiving teller one minute and may be doing something else 10 minutes later, performing a completely different function based on what the customer needs.” As the smallest and newest region under the First Tennessee umbrella, Fox knows his banks face different challenges — and opportunities. “While branches are still important, there is an opportunity for us to make our six offices in the Mid-Atlantic region a destination that the client visits with a purpose,” he said, “Whether it

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is to close a loan transaction, talk with their investment advisor, complete their financial planning, or cash a check for a special holiday trip. But we don’t see that same client visiting the bank weekly as they once did.” To keep those customers satisfied, Fox is confident First Tennessee will continue to improve the online services it currently offers customers. “Even if that kind of behavior continues to evolve, armed with the wonderful array of electronic banking products and mobile banking products our company has, we think we’ve got a great formula for success.” Fox also believes his region is “uniquely positioned” to lead the way into the future. “We will present an opportunity for First Tennessee to evaluate a different kind of operating structure,” he said. “One that is not heavily branch dependent, but rather dependent upon the full array of products that typically you could provide if you had a large branch network.” In short, in the future the Mid-Atlantic region could enjoy the balance of an established banking system and a new type of banking. “We have the benefits of a large branch infrastructure in one dimension,” he said, “but we’ve also

a b o v e : No matter what the future brings, First Tennessee will remain a visible presence on the region’s skylines.

“We have to continue to develop good people, because when you look at the brand behind the words ‘First Tennessee’ it’s not about this building, or the sign. It’s the people here.” — david popw ell 103

their desktop has all the information in the world.” That means the leadership of First Tennessee — along with other companies — has to change to what Daniel compares to a traffic cop or a symphony conductor. “You want to push decision-making down to where the right person has the right amount of information to make decisions.” The changes envisioned for the future will affect the way human resources looks at staffing. If the Internet and call centers eliminate much of the in-person contact with customers, then “what is the implication for human resources?” said Daniel. “We won’t actually be in front of customers as much anymore, so how do we select, train, and develop employees who deal with customers in other ways? What kind of people will get hired, how do we train them, how do we reward them? “It’s all going to be different 10 or 15 years from now — dramatically different from what it was 10 years ago,” he continued. “I’ve got to think about things like that, because if you have fewer interactions with the customer, the ones you do have need to be really special.”

a b o v e : First Tennessee’s headquarters

building in Nashville. Middle Tennessee is especially important to the bank’s future.

got this emerging business model in another dimension, which gives our company the opportunity to harvest the best of both worlds.” In Nashville, Doyle Rippee, president of First Tennessee’s Middle Tennessee region, knows that his banks also face future challenges that may be slightly different from the more established banks in the Memphis area. “We are committed to earning the trust and the business of the people of Middle Tennessee,” said Rippee, “and our goal is for this community to look to us as ‘Nashville’s bank’ the same way people across the state view First Tennessee as ‘Tennessee’s bank.’ We have a great team of bankers, and we’re very excited about our future here.”

he future will almost certainly bring about changes in the way First Tennessee communicates with its own employees. “It used to be that all the information was at the top,” said John Daniel, chief human resources officer. “But the world’s turned upside-down now. If you think about it, everybody at

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ew people at First Tennessee are more aware of the impact of technology than Bruce Livesay, the bank’s chief information officer. Although he can’t quite envision America becoming a truly paperless society, certain features of banks — checking comes to mind — seem to be headed that way. “In recent years it’s really been incredible how everything is moving away from paper and moving to electronics,” Livesay said. “We write very few checks these days. You have a debit card, and you swipe it. As a result, banks don’t handle as much paper as we used to.” Bank operations manager Jim Blasingame says the reduced paper “will reduce the need for a lot of operations functions.” He gave paper bank statements as just one example: “It used to be we’d mail two million a month, but now 52 percent of our statements are online, with no paper produced at all. That number is rising two to three percent every year, so we’ve turned the corner and it just keeps going that way.” While many experts acknowledge the decline — if not the outright demise — of paper checks, Bryan Jordan takes the notion of “paperless payments” a step further, perhaps to a completely electronic payments system. “Obviously a lot more transactions will be done online, using your cellphone or whatever will be available,” said the chairman of First Horizon National Corporation. “But I also think there’s a good chance that 15 to 25 years from now, we might not even have any cash in circulation.”

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nother change the bankers at First Tennessee have noticed is the reduced need for bank visits. “People are going to banks less and less often,” Livesay said, “with the numbers dropping by 5 to 7 percent every year. I don’t think branches are ever going away, but in the future you’re going to see fewer branches and they’re going to be farther apart.” The increase in technology has its advantages, of course. “Building and staffing branches is obviously very costly,” he said. “Technology has allowed banks to grow way beyond what they ever could have done before. It’s allowed them to have a much wider footprint, so a customer can be a customer of our bank and still get access to all of their banking services, whether they live in Tennessee or California.” Technology extends banking beyond the brick and mortar of a traditional bank. And Livesay envisions technology “as a way of allowing people to act the way they do in a branch — only remotely.” One way to improve that remote customer experience, for example, is with real-time video, “where you can just touch a button and talk with a customer service agent who can help you with whatever you need to do. There’s going to be a lot more real-time services, a lot more interaction with different devices.” Even as a bank’s interactions with its customers change, Charles Tuggle believes the world will still have a need for banks themselves. “When you talk about the future, banks have to be there,” said First Horizon’s chief legal counsel. “You can’t have a capitalistic economy without a banking system, right? When you think about it, the core function of a banking system is to allocate credit so people can grow their business. With their deposits, consumers are the source of funds, but what we do is take that money and figure out how to lend it out safely and fairly. And without the availability of credit, there is no capitalistic economy. There is no opportunity for growth.” And, Tuggle said, just as banks are necessary, so are bankers themselves. Despite all sorts of computer programs and financial models, most banking transactions require human beings to make the right decisions. “You can have all kinds of ways to think about things,” said Tuggle, “but at the end of the day, extending credit involves analytics and judgment. One of the most important evaluations bankers ever make is not just a potential borrower’s business, or his financial skills, or anything else. It’s his character. It’s not just his ability to pay you back; it’s his willingness to pay you back. In making that evaluation, you just can’t eliminate the human part of that.”

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Even as banks try to find the proper balance in all this, there’s no denying that technology is the way of the future. “We view it as a must-have,” said Livesay. “If you don’t have certain features, whether its online banking services or apps for your smartphone, people aren’t going to bank with you.” As CIO, it’s Livesay’s job to keep up with these high-tech trends. “Things come and go,” he said, “but I want to make sure that when people look at the skyline, our sign is still here 50 or even 100 years from now.”

dentity theft has been a problem ever since crooks figured out ways to forge signatures, but the increasing use of technology seems to offer even more chances for the “bad guys” to take away from the “good guys.” As First Tennessee’s chief risk officer, Yousef Valine has to ponder “what if” scenarios every hour of every day. “When you talk about fraud, you have to understand that these cycles repeat themselves,” he said. “In the old days, banks became vulnerable when bandits started using cars instead of

a b o v e : Instead of traditional tellers,

“universal bankers” will help customers with anything they need.

“If you sit with me and hear people say why they love our bank, it’s never because our money is any greener than any other bank’s. It’s always about our people.” — brya n jorda n 105

RIGHT: The First Tennessee website (w w w.ftb .com) is “always open.”

“We still have investors that believe in us and communities that are very glad we’re here. I think it’s important for our company to understand that reaching 150 years makes you pretty special in American history.” — ron terry

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running away on horses.” But whether it’s the Internet or credit cards or other new forms of payment, “what happens is there is a period of vulnerability because of the newness,” he said, “but over time the infrastructure always catches them.” One of the keys to First Tennessee’s endurance over the past century and a half is its ability to adapt to whatever changes the bank has faced. “Darwin said it’s not the smartest of the species or the strongest that survived, but the most adaptable,” said Valine. “I would say that is probably at the core of this company — its adaptability and resilience. “This company has been around 150 years,” he continued, “and why is that? Well, one of its characteristics has been its resiliency — learning from mistakes, correcting course, and continuing to evolve.”

ore than anyone else, Bryan Jordan knows that customer behaviors and attitudes are evolving, and First Tennessee will need to adapt to these changes. “In the future, my guess is that bank branches will not look anything like we are accustomed to seeing today,” said the First Horizon chairman. “They might be on the second f loor of a building, or tucked away in an office park somewhere, instead of located on the corner of a busy intersection. Customers might only go there every six months or so, maybe only once a year.” As the brick-and-mortar structures evolve, one constant will be the human presence. “If you sit with me and hear people say why they love our bank, it’s never because our money is any greener than any other bank’s,” he said. “It’s always about our people — because we have built these relationships with people over a long period of time. So people, and the role they play in our business, will always be important.” So what’s on the horizon for First Tennessee, from Jordan’s perspective? “Banks have obviously been around a long time. They are the circulatory system for the economy, so there’s always a role for the banking business,” he said. “I don’t see First Tennessee diversifying away from the banking business. That is our core competency. In fact, I think in the next five to 15 years, we could grow from a $25 billion operation to a $100 billion operation,” he said. “We have intentionally tried to build the infrastructure and the team for allowing us to do that.” Frank Davis, the Ohio businessman who founded the bank in 1864, and the other presidents who have steered the company along the way would be very proud. “We’ve come through good times and bad times,” said Ron Terry, former First Tennessee chairman, “and we still have investors that believe in us and communities that are very glad we’re here. I think it’s important for our company to understand that reaching 150 years makes you pretty special in American history.” •

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ABOVE : On January 7, 2014, bank

president David Popwell rang the closing bell at the New York Stock Exchange to kick off the bank’s 150th anniversary celebration. T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

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Index A

Adams Express Company — 32 Adams, Tommy — 96 Alice Bingham Gallery — 12 Arts Appreciation Foundation — 62 ArtsFirst Grants — 91 Audicron time service — 90 Automated teller machines — 60 AutoZone — 61 Baker, Gerald — 64 Bank of Memphis — 32 BankAmericard — 58 Banker’s Row, Memphis — 30, 42 Baptist Hospital — 62 Barnet, Will — 14 Battle of Memphis — 22 Bingham, George Caleb — 64 Blasingame, Jim — 5, 85, 102, 104 Boys Club of Memphis — 62 Bradbury, Betty — 82-83 Bravo Awards — 91 Bristol Motor Speedway — 96 Brooks, William H. — 25 Brown, Charles Brady — 25 Burkett, Charles — 94

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First Tennessee Heritage Mural: Nancy Ward by ted faiers (1908-1985) Born in Monroe County, Tennessee, Ward (1738-1822) was a Cherokee “Beloved Woman” who could attend meetings with other tribal leaders.

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Capital Assets Corporation — 74 Central State National Bank — 42 Chandler Wrecking Co. — 50 Charles Q. Harris Leadership Award — 34 Cheekwood Botanical Garden and Museum — 95 Cherry, Kim — 81, 91, 94 Civil War — 7, 14, 23-25, 32, 89 Cloar, Carroll — 36, 83 Community Service Room — 90 Continental Baking Co. — 52 Continental Bank — 34 Cornwell, Dean — 28-29 Cossitt Library — 34, 50 Cotton Exchange — 20-21 Court Square — 33 Crockett, Davy — 10-12, 14 Crown Finance Corp. — 58 Crump, E.H. — 14, 83 Cummings Sign Company — 51

Daniel, John — 80, 85, 104 Davidson County Courthouse — 28 Davis, Frank — 24-26, 31-34, 106 De BeVoise, S.H. — 25 Delta Queen — 66 DeSoto, Hernando — 58 Doney, Thomas — 64 Dulin Gallery, Knoxville — 13 Ellington, Gov. Buford — 50 Elrod, Biff — 93 Elston, I.C. — 25

Faiers, Leona — 14 Faiers, Ted — 1-2, 8-9, 11-15, 23, 32-33, 5455, 59, 76-77, 86-87, 108-112 Fansler, Pam — 95 Farmers and Merchants Bank — 22, 41 Federal Company (Tyson Foods) — 52 Federal Express Corp. — 60 Federal Reserve Act — 42 Financial Portfolio Advisers — 74 First Express — 60-61 First Horizon Home Loans — 64 First Place ATMs — 60 First Tennessee Plaza, Knoxville — 60 First Tennessee Capital Markets — 72 First Tennessee Foundation — 92-96 First Tennessee Heritage Collection — 11-15 First Tennessee Women’s Initiative — 85 FirstLink call center — 102 Firstpower — 80-85 Firstpower Council — 78-79, 83 Fort Pickering — 32 Fourth Chickasaw Bluff — 19 Fox, John — 96, 103 Frist Center for the Visual Arts — 95 FTB Advisors — 50 Future Memphis — 52

Gaylord Entertainment — 64 Gayoso House/Hotel — 21 German Bank — 41 Gilow, Betty — 15 Glass, Kenneth — 64

Goodwyn Institute — 50 Goodwyn, William Adophus — 50 Gorman, Alice Bingham — 12-15, 92 Grand Ole Opry — 14, 86-87 Grand Opera House — 34 Great Depression — 42, 57 Great Memphis Bridge — 34-35 Greater Memphis Civitan Club — 62 Gruber, Rick — 15 Gusmus, Frank — 72 Gwyn, William A. — 25

Hamilton Bank, Chattanooga — 58 Handy, W.C. — 83 Harrah’s Casino — 64 Harris, Charles Q. — 33-34 Hawkins, Steve — 85, 98, 102 Highland Capital Management — 63 Hilliard, Herb — 82, 94 Holiday Inns — 52, 61 Home Financial Corp.-62 — 63 Homecoming ’86 — 92 Hopkins, Bruce — 82 Horn, Ralph — 53, 63, 70-71, 81-82 Houston, Sam — 93 Howe, Lewis — 25 Hughes, Jimmie — 72 Hunter Museum of Art, Chattanooga — 13 Hyde, J.R. “Pitt” — 61 Ingram, William — 53

Internal Revenue Service — 61

Jackson Insurance Company — 32 Jackson, Andrew — 18-19 Jones, Casey — 14 Jones, J.A. — 50 Jones, N.M. — 41 Jones, Walk C., architects — 50 Jordan, Bryan — 6-7, 64, 81-83, 104-106 Jordan, Dewitt — 36-37 Junior Achievement — 94

King, Dr. Martin Luther — 12, 61 Kisber, Michael — 72, 74, 103 Land Trust of Tennessee — 96 LeBonheur Children’s Hospital — 52

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Lee, Terry — 14, 81, 92 Lemm, Adele — 46-47, 98-99 Lesson Line — 92 Lewis, George — 70, 74 Lincoln, Abraham — 7, 24 Livesay, Bruce — 104-105 Look magazine — 52 Losch, William — 81 Low, Chris — 73

Malone & Hyde — 61 Maryland National Mortgage Co. — 63 McClung, Charles — 13 McGregor, Robert — 25 McLemore, John C. — 19 Memphis Academy of Arts — 14, 46 Memphis and Charleston Railroad — 24 Memphis and Shelby County Airport Authority — 94 Memphis and Shelby County Sports Authority — 62 Memphis Area Chamber of Commerce — 62 Memphis Brooks Museum of Art — 15 Memphis College of Art — 14-15 Memphis Country Club — 70-71 Memphis International Airport — 60 Memphis Jobs Conference — 61-62, 91 Memphis Municipal Airport — 43, 89 Memphis Park Commission — 94 Memphis Port Authority — 94 Memphis Rotary Club — 52 Memphis State University Alumni Association — 62 Memphis Street Railway — 34 Memphis University School — 52 Miller, Dave — 85 Morgan, Allen Sr. — 45-48, 52-53, 63, 90 Mueser, William. H. — 50 Murphy Oil Company — 52

Nashville and Memphis Telegraph Co. — 32 Nashville City Center — 60 National Association of Female Executives — 85 National Banking Acts of 1863 & 1864 — 25 National Civil Rights Museum — 94 New South Bank — 63

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New York Stock Exchange — 107 Norlen Life Insurance Corp. — 58

Omberg, James — 40-42 Omlie, Phoebe — 14 Operation Breakthrough — 91 Operations Computer Service Center — 58 Orpheum Theatre — 61 Overton, John — 18-21

Pace, Sally — 73, 102-103 Peabody Hotel — 12, 34, 61 Piggly Wiggly supermarket — 43 Polk, James — 109 Popwell, David — 82, 96, 102-103, 107 Porter. D.T Building — 34 Portfolio Strategies Group — 74 Presley, Elvis — 11, 14, 15, 111 Promus Companies — 64 Public Relations Society of America — 62

Ragland, Samuel — 40-45 Rawlinson, Fred — title page Reagan, President Ronald — 62 Rhodes College — 15, 62 Rippee, Doyle — 95-96, 104 Roark, Eldon — 51, 53 Robertson, James — 24 Romanow, Tim — 72 Ron Terry Center — 46 Rose, Michael — 61, 64

Saunders, Fleming — 25 Schulte, C.W. — 40-41 Seagram Building, New York — 53 Sevier State Office Building — 28 Shaman, Floyd — 14 Shelby Farms Park Conservancy — 62 Shreve, Amy — 85 Sims, Mary — 18 Smith, Dolph — 97 Smith, Fred — 61 Smithwick, Presley S. — 42 South Central Bell — 52 Springfield, Susan — 82-83, 85 St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital — 92 St. Mary’s Episcopal Cathedral — 33

Stalnecker, Bette — 50 Stuart, C. — 10 Sturm, Dorothy — 74 Sunbelt National Mortgage Co. — 63

Tamboli, Roy — 13-14 Tennessee Municipal Securities Act — 71 Tennessee State Museum — 13 Tennessee Valley Authority — 14, 51, 59 Terry Ron — 4, 10-15, 54, 58-63, 72, 79-81, 91, 106 Thatcher, W.W. — 33 Trezevant Manor — 52 Tuggle, Charles — 85, 105 Turner, Norfleet — 4, 44-46, 63, 89-91 Turner, Rod — 72-73 Twersky, Steve — 74

U.S. Postal Service — 61 United American Bank, Knoxville — 60 United Way — 52, 92 University of Memphis — 62, 94 University of Tennessee — 62, 95

Valadié, Steve — 73 Valine, Yousef — 105-106 Valley National Bank, Phoenix — 12 Victorian Village — 24 Vogel, Jim — 71, 79-80, 103

Waddell, Mike — 73-74 Wallace, John G. — 25 War of 1812 — 12 Ward, Nancy — 108 Wells, Ida B. — 110 Wilson, Kemmons — 52 Winchester, James — 19 Winchester, Marcus — 22 WMC Radio — 50

Yellow fever epidemic — 7, 32-34, 57, 89 York, Sgt. Alvin — 11

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First Tennessee Heritage Mural: James Polk by ted faiers (1908-1985) Born in North Carolina, Polk (17951849) served as governor of Tennessee before being elected the 11th president of the United States.

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Sources / Acknowledgements #3

SOURCES —BOOKS Capers, Gerald. The Biography of a River Town. Published by Gerald Capers, 1966 Crawford, Charles. Yesterday’s Memphis. E.A. Seamann Publishing, Inc., 1976 Harkins, John. Metropolis of the American Nile: Memphis and Shelby County. Guild Bindery Press, 1982 Keating, James M. and O.F. Vedder. History of the City of Memphis and Shelby County, Tennessee. Originally published 1888; reprinted by Burke’s Book Store and Frank and Gennie Myers, no date Lauderdale, Vance. Ask Vance: The Best Questions and Answers from Memphis Magazine’s History and Trivia Expert. Bluff City Books, 2003 Ornelas-Struve, Carole and Fredrick Lee Coulter. Memphis: 18001900. Nancy Powers & Company, Publishers, 1982 Roper, James. The Founding of Memphis. Memphis Sesquicentennial, Inc., 1970 The First Hundred Years: A History of the First National Bank of Memphis. First National Bank, 1964 Tuttle, David R. Since 1864: The Story of Memphis’ Oldest Financial Institution. First National Bank of Memphis, 1939

SOURCES — OTHER PUBLICATIONS Annual reports published by First National, First Tennessee, and First Horizon. The Commercial Appeal, the Memphis Press-Scimitar, the Memphis Daily Appeal, and other newspapers archived in the Memphis and Shelby County Room of the Benjamin Hooks Central Library, and the Special Collections Department of the University of Memphis Libraries.

photogr aphy & art All images used throughout this book are provided courtesy of First Horizon National Corporation / First National Bank, with these exceptions: p. 6 p. 13

Bryan Jordan photograph by Larry Kuzniewski Alice Bingham Gorman photograph courtesy Special Collections, University of Memphis Libraries p.16-17 Harper’s Weekly illustration of the Memphis riverfront courtesy Memphis and Shelby County Room, Benjamin Hooks Central Library p. 20 Cotton Exchange illustration courtesy Memphis and Shelby County Room, Benjamin Hooks Central Library p. 20 Early Memphis plan courtesy Memphis and Shelby County Room, Benjamin Hooks Central Library p. 21 Gayoso House illustration courtesy Memphis and Shelby County Room, Benjamin Hooks Central Library p. 22 Harper’s Weekly Civil War illustration courtesy Memphis and Shelby County Room, Benjamin Hooks Central Library p.26-27 Harper’s Weekly illustration of “The Levee at Memphis” courtesy Memphis and Shelby County Room, Benjamin Hooks Central Library p. 30 Harper’s Weekly illustration of “Banker’s Row” courtesy Memphis and Shelby County Room, Benjamin Hooks Central Library p. 32 Mosquito photograph courtesy of Umnola | Dreamstime p. 33 Charles Q. Harris photograph from the Memphis News Scimitar, courtesy Special Collections, University of Memphis Libraries p. 34 Drinking water photograph courtesy Zwawol | Dreamstime p. 34 Court Square illustration courtesy Memphis and Shelby County Room, Benjamin Hooks Central Library p. 35 Great Memphis Bridge photo courtesy Memphis and Shelby County Room, Benjamin Hooks Central Library p. 40 First National Bank building photograph courtesy Memphis and Shelby County Room, Benjamin Hooks Central Library p. 50 Construction site photograph courtesy Special Collections, University of Memphis Libraries p. 52 Swimming pool photograph courtesy Holiday Inns Corporation p. 53 Parrot photograph courtesy Special Collections, University of Memphis Libraries p. 107 Photograph courtesy New York Stock Exchange

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First Tennessee Heritage Mural: Ida B. Wells by ted faiers (1908-1985) The crusading journalist (1862-1931) gained a national following for her articles on race relations and is an icon of the civil rights movement.

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ACK NOW LEDGEMENTS The First 150: The First Tennessee Story could not have been produced without the generous support and assistance of: first horizon national corporation D. Bryan Jordan Chairman, President, and CEO The employees and interns of corporate communications: Regine Arnold Jack Bradley Kim Cherry Aleta Coatney Christine Dickason Melissa Duong

contemporary media, inc. / creative content division Kenneth Neill Publisher and CEO Jennifer K. Oswalt Chief Financial Officer Jeffrey Goldberg Director of New Business Development Michael Finger Senior Editor Brian Groppe Creative Director Frank Murtaugh Managing Editor

Thomas Eldred Sandy Hale

Teresa Hendrix

SPECIA L THA NKS TO

Kyle Hines

The staff of the Memphis and Shelby County Room of the Benjamin Hooks Central Library, especially manager Wayne Dowdy, Gina Cordell, Laura Cunningham, and Sarah Frierson.

Caitlin Markle Nunda Morris Bill Stanfield Will Tyner Crystal Welch And the scores of First Tennessee employees, retirees, and supporters who made this book possible.

The staff of the Special Collections Department at the University of Memphis Libraries, especially director Edwin G. Frank, Sharon Banker, Chris Ratliff, and Brigitte Billeaudeaux. The publisher also appreciates the support and assistance of Greg Akers, Anna Cox, Marilyn Sadler, Bonnie Daws Kourvelas, and Anne Cunningham O’Neill. above

First Tennessee Heritage Mural: Elvis Presley by ted faiers (1908-1985) Elvis walked into Sun Studio and changed the world of music forever. The King of Rock-and-Roll sold more than one billion records worldwide. T he F i r st T ennessee S to r y

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right

First Tennessee Heritage Mural: Birds of Tennessee (sketch)

by ted faiers (1908-1985) Faiers originally prepared more than 40 sketches to show Ron Terry his concept for the mural. According to the Heritage Collection curator Alice Gorman, the bank chairman took just one hour to approve all of them.

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