The guards at the Smithsonian get asked most, they say, about one particular exhibit that they claim the Smithsonian doesn't have. I'm referring to a certain part of John Dillinger's anatomy.

Supposedly, he was nicely endowed. The thing is, I think it might be true. He basically operated in Northern Indiana and NW Ohio. The places where he robbed banks or lay his head surround my old stomping grounds. And he was active mostly in the 1920s and early 1930s, when my mother was young. Mama said she never met the fellow, but as much as she detested violence in all forms, she seemed to have almost an affection for John Dillinger, as if he was a friend of a friend. And she told me she was told - reliably - that the stories about his anatomy were true, although she didn't want to say how she knew.

Got A Penny?

Then she'd change the subject, and start talking about penny auctions. When the depression started, mortgages as we know them didn't exist. You'd get a note for a year. The next year, you'd pay the interest and put something down on the principle, rolling the rest of the balance over. If the bank didn't want to roll the note, you stood to have the property sold at auction, losing everything you had.

There were a lot of bank failures in the depression. In these days before FDIC, you didn't know who would hold your mortgage when it came time to roll it over - and it really didn't matter. You could ask anyone to buy a mortgage from you by paying off the old mortgage - but if none of them wanted to take a chance on your mortgage, you lost your happy home.

A Friend In Need

People responded by crowding around the sheriff when he auctioned a friend's property. If legitimate buyers weren't able to bid, one of John's friends would buy the property, free of a mortgage, for pennies on the dollar. That's not morally right - but it's not entirely wrong, either.

I attended a penny auction in the 1970s. The guy's father had died, leaving this farm (among other property) to be divided among the family and the family was squabbling. He'd lived on the farm for 40 years, and raised his family there. Some of his father's other farms had already been auctioned, for top dollar. He made the first bid on his own farm, and it wasn't a typical "first bid" for an auction. It was more like a final bid - not top dollar by any means, and perhaps even a "low average" valuation for the property, but it wasn't a great bargain, either.

In Cleats, For A Dollar

I looked over the people in the crowd. There was plenty of room for the bidders, and any of them could have been seen, had they raised a hand, or pointed with his nose. There were people in the crowd I didn't approve of, people who'd have walked over their own mothers in football cleats if someone paid them a dollar to do so. None of them was willing to look the son in the face. If anyone had placed a bid, it would have been a free-for-all, with active bidding raising the price 50% in the next three minutes. None of them, however, was willing to pay the price of being the first to bid against the son.

It was bad enough for the auctioneer. He'd not been able to persuade anyone else to bid on the property. Auctioneers are always suspected of favoring some bidders over others, or of bringing down the gavel too soon. If truth be told, an auctioneer does deliberately bring down the gavel too soon, early in the auction, letting some goods go for bargain prices, in order to teach the bidders that they need to bid aggressively in order to get some of those bargains. That aggressive bidding benefits the seller overall - but sometimes the seller feels cheated. After this auction, he didn't get any other big auctions for years.

Banker Must Want To Be Hated

But mostly, people reserve their venom for banks. Bankers are viewed as crooks that, by careful extension of favors, manage to avoid prison. Nobody cried too many tears when Al Capone was imprisoned for income tax evasion, or when he died of venereal disease. Capone was, in theory, a used furniture dealer. It was widely held that he earned his wealth through bootlegging, prostitution and gambling. Those are activities in which the purported "victim" engages willingly, presumably knowing all the facts (although one might conceivably end up with tainted whiskey, diseased whores, or be cheated at the tables) but there's little sympathy for criminals who fill unmet wants. Those who take money by force should find even less community support - but John Dillinger, Robin Hood, and Jesse James were popular because they took the loot from those considered to be even greater crooks.

Sounds good to me. Bankers aren't necessarily crooked but Damon Runyan pointed out, "the race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong", and yet, that's the way to bet. Mr. Potter, of "Miracle on 34th Street" ended up owning the bank, buying at a bargain during a panic.

I wrote before about having difficulties with charges against my account from a counterfeit debit card. I got Blue Ball National Bank to charge back those amounts, partially by arguing that the charges were made in Oregon, and that I hadn't been west of the Mississippi in a decade, and never to Oregon.

They Think We're Stupid

Then in a post entitled Weis Markets and Fraud, I wrote about Blue Ball National Bank allowing Weis Markets to debit my checking account twice with the same check. I couldn't get Blue Ball to credit my account, and I couldn't get the law to prosecute Weis for forgery. I eventually got Weis to return the money, but it wasn't very fast, and I found the effort quite unsatisfactory.

Then Blue Ball National Bank, now renamed Susquehanna Bank, allowed my bank account to be used for money laundering. I noticed the shenanigans going on, and stepped in - but Susquehanna bank violated Regulation E by taking money that wasn't theirs. In September, I filed suit in District Justice court.

Winning Isn't Enough

On October 5, I won my lawsuit. About November 9, they were still ignoring the judgment awarded me by the court, so I asked the court to levy the scofflaws. Finally, on December 10, constable Jeffrey Pokopec was able to get them to write a check for my judgment, and on Friday, I was able to get them to give me currency in exchange for their check. Whew!

Now, I'm not sure why Mr. Pokopec was involved. Susquehanna Bank has their main office at 1570 Manheim Pike. I opened my account at a branch that's no longer open in Willow Street, and did most of my banking at a branch that's no longer open, across the street from the Health Campus. I live in Lancaster City, but was told I needed to file my lawsuit at Ms. Sponaugle's court on Elm Avenue, behind WGAL, instead of at Ms. Hartman's court on Union Street. Mr. Pokopec, however, is the constable for Mount Joy.

How Does This Work?

They divide Lancaster County's District Justices into four duty areas. Ms. Sponaugle's and Ms. Hartman's are in the central duty court, while District Justice William Reuter's court is in the Northwest Sector. I'm not distressed by Mr. Polopec's handling of the matter; I'm just confused.

I am however, rather unhappy with Susquehanna Bank.

Looking For Alternatives

The folks at Northwest claim to be the most trustworthy savings bank in America according to Forbes Magazine; in fact, the only savings bank in the top 100. When I look at the actual listing in Forbes, though, they aren't the only bank in the top 100, nor even the top bank in the listings. It turns out that they're parsing words, and what's more, not using the standard definitions.

What they call a "savings bank" is what the business press calls a "thrift" and what is often called a "savings and loan" or a "building and loan" association. Until the 1970s, they couldn't offer checking accounts, and they could only offer mortgages, not other types of loans. These days, there doesn't seem to be any useful distinction between the two.

What's more, honesty and ethics isn't part of trustworthiness, at least as Forbes defines it.

Honesty Isn't Worth Much To Forbes

I don't know that honesty and ethics are lacking at Northwest, although their advertising obviously raises some questions about that. They didn't take any TARP funds, although I'm not sure why. Were they not eligible? Were they unwilling to put up with the strings? Were they so flush with their own funds that they couldn't use any more?

Still, they're offering $100 to you if you open a checking account with them that's funded with a regular electronic deposit of a paycheck, social security check or whatever. They only have three branches in Lancaster - a little branch on Columbia next to the GOP headquarters at West End Avenue, a bigger one on Manheim Pike at Dillerville Road, and a third I've never seen on Orange between Prince and Queen. There are also branches in Lititz, New Holland, E-town, Mount Joy, Columbia and Wrightsville. That's not nearly as many as PNC has, but it may be enough for you.

I've pretty well crossed Susquehanna, Fulton, and Sovereign off my Christmas list. I sure hope somebody decides be behave, before I run out of options. Oh, well, I'm getting old. If I'm lucky, maybe I'll die before all of them prove themselves to be stinkers.

Other Bloggers On Related Topics:
auctioneers - Blue Ball National Bank - constable - Damon Runyan - District Justice - football cleats - Forbes Magazine - John Dillinger - Miracle on 34th Street - Northwest Savings Bank - penis - penny auction - Robin Hood - scofflaw - Susquehanna Bank - Weis Market - WGAL