Shortly after the passage of the National Bank Act by Congress in 1864, several banks were chartered in Erie. One of these, Dime Savings and Loan, was founded in 1866; it was reorganized as the Erie Trust Company in 1902. The economic boom following World War I set off a flurry of building activity in downtown Erie, including a ten-story skyscraper at 12th and State Streets. By the mid-1920s, the Erie Trust Company had become the dominant banking institution in the city and needed space to expand. The bank hired the New York City-architectural firm Dennison and Hirons in 1925 to design its new headquarters—the firm also designed the Home Savings Bank Building in Albany, New York. The Erie Trust Company Building was completed in 1928 at a cost of $2 million. A year later, the stock market crashed sparking the Great Depression, and, by 1933, the Erie Trust Company went bankrupt. Its remnants and that of another defunct bank were reorganized into the National Bank and Trust, which continued to occupy its former headquarters now owned by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.