Volume 2 - ElectricCanadian.com

270 HISTORY OF THE BANKcash book would be written. The outgoing mail in answerto that just received had to be prepared and delivered at thepost office four miles away in time for the return stage, whichleft promptly at six o'clock the next morning."The officers who went to Langham (Saskatchewan)before the mam line of the Canadian Northern Railway 1from Winnipeg was completed to that town, had the experienceof running a bank for a considerable period without safe, booksor bank stationery. The office equipment had been shipped,but had gone astray and could not be traced. The accountswere kept in an ordinary journal and scribbling book purchasedat the local store, and the small memorandum booksissued by the bank for advertising purposes had to sufficethe customers for pass-books. At night the manager'sclub bag served as the repository of bills and securities, andthe cash was kept in the old-fashioned way between themattress and the springs of the manager's bed at the hotel.The bedroom door was carefully barred with a hickoryhockey-stick.This manager and his staff had been outstripped atanother place in the race to open a branch and wished toredeem their reputations. During the first winter a telegramarrived in code, but as the code-book had disappeared withthe stationery, the message could not be deciphered. Oneword, "Radisson," gave the manager a clue.to open a branch at"They want usRadisson," he intuitively guessed, andat once despatched the teller on a freight train to that place.Immediately on arrival, the latter had a sign, "The CanadianBank of Commerce," painted, and placed on a hastily rentedbuilding. The next morning the inspector of another bankcame driving in from Battleford to establish a branch.Seeing the sign he drove on to Langham in disgust, veryangry and very cold. The Langham manager'searlier rebuffin the sporting business of "beating the other fellow to it"was thus offset.1 Now the Canadian National Railways.