Then and Now: The Lincoln Building

May 10-In the depths of the Great Depression, the Federal Home Loan Bank Act of 1932 offered federal underwriting and direct loans to small banks called savings and loan associations. Sometimes called thrifts or mutual savings banks, many popped up around the country.

The small banks were generally limited to passbook savings, home loans and a few other services. This neighborly ideal was dramatized in the 1946 film "It's a Wonderful Life," where a small community makes a run on its local bank. This happened across the country in 1933. To restore faith in banking after the crisis, new federal underwriting for the savings and loan associations brought customers back.

One early firm in Spokane was National Saving and Loan Association, formed by several prominent business people, including A.W. Lindsay, around 1920. Lindsay's sons, Roderick and younger son Donald worked for their father and opened First Federal Savings and Loan Association in 1934 after their father's death a year earlier. Within three months of opening, First Federal had mortgages on 20 homes, amortized from five year to 20 years.

The Lindsay brothers merged with another thrift in 1950 and renamed it Lincoln First Federal, Roderick Lindsay said, "to typify the warm friendly service we try to render and to avoid confusion of our institution with other organizations of similar names."

The 16th president's likeness was used on letterhead, advertising and promotional items like piggy banks and calendars.

After many years in a building at 120 N. Wall St., the company erected an eight-story tower at Riverside Avenue and Lincoln Street that opened in 1964.

Donald Lindsay, then Lincoln's CEO, commissioned renowned illustrator Norman Rockwell to paint a giant portrait of Abraham Lincoln in 1965. It hung in the lobby of the bank for 20 years.

The name was changed to Lincoln Mutual Savings in 1976, in an era of high interest rates that put a squeeze on thrifts. Like many S&L associations in the 1980s, Lincoln didn't survive and was taken over by Washington Mutual, the largest savings and loan in the U.S. at the time.

Roderick died in 1991 and Donald died in 2000.

Washington Mutual also failed in 2008, with most assets transferred to JPMorgan Chase.

Jesse Tinsley can be reached at (509) 459-5378 or at jesset@spokesman.com.

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