Jarmulowsky's Bank

NY TIMES: Sender Jarmulowsky arrived in the United States from Russia in the early 1870's and by 1878 had established a bank in an existing building at the southwest corner of Canal and Orchard, already an immigrant district. In 1886, 1890, 1893 and 1901, he experienced various bank runs but proudly paid 100 cents on the dollar to each panicky depositor. In 1912, with the architects Rouse & Goldstone, Jarmulowsky put up a reserved, 12-story loft building with a bank on the ground floor at the same corner where he had established himself 30 years earlier.

It was, with its rusticated limestone lower section and a terra-cotta upper part, no barebones loft building. The entrance to the ground-floor bank at the curved corner is surmounted by two reclining figures in classical style flanking a clock. Period photographs of the banking floor show a conventional work of marble and bronze; it could have been any well-known uptown bank.

Sender Jarmulowsky died in 1912 as his building neared completion; The Times noted he left "only $501,053" as an estate, apparently expecting much more. His sons Harry and Louis continued the business. In 1917, as depositors withdrew nearly $3 million to send to overseas relatives caught in the war, the State Banking Department took over Sender Jarmulowsky's bank. It had liabilities of $1.25 million and assets of only $600,000. Over 5,000 depositors crowded around the branch and Harry and Louis Jarmulowsky were indicted for banking fraud later in the year. The bank never reopened and the building was sold at a bankruptcy auction in 1920.