El Banco de Guanajuato
The Banco de Guanajuato was established on 25 April 1900 and began to operate on 3 SeptemberLa Gaceta Comercial, 18 September 1900. Its shareholders included Enrique C. Creel, representing the Compañía Anglo Mexicana, Juan Brittingham, Antonio V. Hernández, Gerardo and Eduardo Meade, the last representing the Banco de San Luis Potosí, Matías Hernández Soberón, Mariano Hernández Ceballos, J. H. Bahnsen y Compañía, Tomás Olavaria y Compañía, Agustín González, as manager of the firm Sucesores de Eusebio González and Ramón Alcázar, both for himself and as manager of Stallforth, Alcázar y Compañía, Carlos Chico, Dwight Furness, Carlos Robles, Federico Saavedra, Ramón Alcázar júnior, Jesús Fernández, Juan B. Castelazo, Ignacio Gaytan, Luis Robles Rocha and Ponciano Aguilar. Its inital capital was $500,000 divided into 5,000 shares of $100 each.
In the first general assembly in August Enrique C. Creel proposed a provisional board of Ramón Alcázar as presidente; Dwight Furness as primer escrutador; Carlos Chico as segundo escrutador and Carlos Robles as secretarioAGN, ABE, Banco de Guanajuato, catálogo 1.23.1, Libro de Actas, fs. 2, August 1900. They then appointed the first board (Consejo de Administración) with Consejeros Propietarios: Ramón Alcázar, Enrique Creel, Agustín González, Carlos Chico and Dwight Furness; Consejeros Suplentes: Ramón Alcázar, jr., Federico Saavedra, Jesús Fernández, Juan B. Castelazo and Luis Robles Rocha; Comisario propietario: Carlos Robles and Comisarios suplentes: Ignacio Gaytán and Ponciano Aguilar.
The bank opened branches in Guadalajara in 1902initially established on 1 November 1902 as an agency under Federico and Guillermo Kunhardt but converted to a branch, with its own manager and board, on 9 December, in Irapuato in 1903 and in Zamora, Michoacán, on 20 September 1903report of interventor Baz, 30 July 1903 (Memoria de la Instituciones de Crédito, correspondiente al año 1903), Periódico Oficial, Michoacán, tomo XI, Núm. 82, 11 October 1903. The concession was granted in April 1902, possibly influenced by Ramón Alcázar whose father came from there and where he owned property.
The share capital was increased several times: to $750,000 in 1902, to a million pesos in 1904 and to three million pesos in 1905.
In November 1910 Kunard, the manager of the Guadalajara branch, told Bustamante that a Maderista uprising was planned for 20 November and wanted to deposit his funds in the Banco Nacional de México. Bustamante passed the warning on to President Díaz, who thought it unfounded but told [ ] APorfirio Díaz, Telegramas 1910, folio 4472 telegram Díaz, Guanajuato, 17 November 1910. In fact the uprising started prematurely with Aquiles Serdán in Puebla on 18 November.
On 5 December 1913 the manager of the bank, José P. Bustamante, was sent to prison, accused of not destroying notes that had been withdrawn from circulation but instead putting them back into circulation and hiding the book recording the incinerationsEl Barretero, 5 December 1913.
On 26 June 1914 the bank closed its offices in Guanajuato. Various of the principal employees had already left for Mexico City El Observador, Guanajuato, Año X, Núm. 864, 28 June 1914.
The bank did not furnish any documents to Carranza's Comisión Reguladora e Inspectora de Instituciones de Crédito so on 8 December 1915 it was visited by Inspector Rafael Torres. The bank claimed that, as comunications had only just been reestablished between Guanajuato and Guadalajara and Zamora, it did not have the relevant information and asked for a delay. However, the Comisión decided that, as it has not complied within the prescribed time, its concession was forfeit.
The bank was finally liquidated in 1921.