The New York herald., 1921-01-19
At the End Of the Rainbow.

, dormant bank account revealed
by the publication Of the reports of
the unclaimed money held by a bank
seems to have somewhat the same
lure TO a seeker of an easy fortune
as buried treasure to the location
Of which he has a more or less mys-
tifying chart. II the account is in
his own name he Is content to waste
little time on its recovery. but il it
| is in the name of an ancestor or rel
ative who long ago disappeared or
died intestate there is a chance for
speculation on it's value. The ques-
tion becomes the same as in the case
of the buried treasure, Is it worth
digging for?
1t was for many years a pleasing
fiction to picture the vaults of the
older saving banks bulging with the
gold and accumulated interest of long
dormant accounts. Sometimes it was
said that from this wealth bank build
ings were constructed. 1t was so
interesting fiction that it died hard.
Not long ago twenty five persons ap-
reared as heirs of the man in whose
name New York savings bank car
rled a dormant account. The de-
positor. who was an old sea captain,
died on an East Indian cruise, and,
having been a secretive, silent old
fellow, his heirs had somehow got the
idea that he had entrusted to the
institution about 100000 in money
and bonds An investiga tion showed
that the whole amount of his account
was $50, Il dollar apiece for the heirs.
In Missouri recently a suit, in which
102 claimants were named, was insti-
tuted to recover the lapsed account of
q civil war veteran. The amount
claimed was several thousand dollars.
The actual amount disclosed by an
examination Of the books was $10.S5.
For fifty years it was believed that
noble victims of the French Revolu-
tion had placed on deposit In the
Bank of England or had stored away
in the bank vaults millions in money,
gold plate and Jewels, and that since
the owners and their heirs had died
by the guillotine the Bank of England
was only awaiting the proper time to
make a claim for all this wealth. So
persistent We're these reports and so
plausible some Of the statements made
regarding their correctness that the
bank few years ago welcomed an
investigation of the matter. This re-
vealed the fact that the money and
property entrusted to the Institution
by the French emigres were of small
value and that the last deposit had |
been turned over 20 the legal owner or
his heirs before the middle of the last |
century.
The number of dormant accounts
i'm this State, as recently reported by.
the State Banking Department, is !
about $4,000. There is no estimate
made Of the amount. but the bankers
say that the accounts are oil small
and the number which reach the old |
time savings bank limit Of from 81 1000 |
to $1,000 Is negligible. Instead of
being profit to the banks they are
more or less a charge, and the prob
lem OF doing away with dormant ac-
counts or Of reducing their number
comes up for solution at
the meetings of associations Of banks
and savings banks In 1916 the
amount paid back on dormant claims
according to the report of the State
Banking Department was $7431 80; !
in 1918 it was ST6.0G, In 1914 S32.63
and in 1915 only Sf2S7. Hardly
worth digging for by fortune hunter
with a vision Of millions or even