chase (bank)

Chase is the consumer and commercial banking division of JPMorgan Chase.[2] The bank was known as Chase Manhattan Bank until it merged with J.P. Morgan & Co. in 2000.[1] Chase Manhattan Bank was formed by the merger of the Chase National Bank and the Bank of the Manhattan Company in 1955.[3] The bank is headquartered in Chicago.
The Manhattan Company
Main article: Bank of the Manhattan Company

Chase traces its history back to the founding of The Manhattan Company by Aaron Burr on September 1, 1799, in a house at 40 Wall Street:[1]

After an epidemic of yellow fever in 1798, in which coffins had been sold by itinerant vendors on street corners, Aaron Burr established the Manhattan Company, with the ostensible aim of bringing clean water to the city from the Bronx River but in fact designed as a front for the creation of New York's second bank, rivaling Alexander Hamilton's Bank of New York.
—The Economist[4]

In addition to being fierce political and personal rivals, Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton competed in business, with Burr's Bank of the Manhattan Company competing against Hamilton's Bank of New York. In 1804, their rivalry erupted into a duel, leading to the death of Alexander Hamilton. The dueling pistols are owned by the successor company of Chase Manhattan. They are currently on display on the executive conference floor of the JP Morgan Chase building at 277 Park Avenue in New York City.
[edit] Chase National Bank

Chase National Bank was formed in 1877 by John Thompson.[1] It was named for former United States Treasury Secretary and Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase,[3] although Chase did not have a connection with the bank.[1]

The Chase National Bank acquired a number of smaller banks in the 1920s, through its Chase Securities Corporation. In 1926, for instance, it acquired Mechanics and Metals National Bank.

Its most significant acquisition though was the Equitable Trust Company of New York in 1930, the largest stockholder of which was John D. Rockefeller, Jr.[5] This made it the largest bank in America and indeed the world.

Chase was primarily a wholesale bank, dealing with other prominent financial institutions and major corporate clients, such as General Electric, which had, through its RCA affiliate, leased prominent space and become a crucial first tenant of Rockefeller Center, rescuing that major project in 1930. The bank also is closely associated with and has financed the oil industry, having longstanding connections with its board of directors to the successor companies of Standard Oil, especially ExxonMobil, which are also Rockefeller holdings.