Site of Midland County's First Bank

Duane's take

The official marker's the one tellin' this story, and I'm just the voice carryin' it down the road. Now, if you want to talk about bedrock, about something that held when everything else was shakin', let me tell you about the First National Bank of Midland. Organized on June 16, 1890, right there in Midland County.

Three men stepped up as first officers. A. W.

Hilliard took the president's chair. W. H.

Cowden came in as vice president. And W. E.

Connell handled the books as cashier. Three names, one institution, and a whole lot of West Texas ahead of them. Now, out here in this country, disaster doesn't always announce itself politely.

Drought rolls in, quiet and relentless. Other calamities come and go over the years, the kind that can reduce a man's life work to dust and debt before he even knows what hit him. But here's the part worth leaning in for.

Through all of it, the financial stability of this bank saved its customers from ruin. Not just inconvenience. Not just setbacks.

Ruin. That's the word the marker uses, and it earns every letter. A bank organized in 1890 standing between the people of Midland County and the worst this land could throw at them.

That's not just banking. That's a kind of faith with a vault on it.

What the marker says

First National Bank of Midland. Organized June 16, 1890. First officers were A. W. Hilliard, president; W.H. Cowden, vice president; and W. E. Connell, cashier. Its financial stability has saved its customers from ruin in the face of drouth or other disasters over the years. (1969)