William Harding (banker)

William Proctor Gould Harding (born May 5, 1864 in Boligee , Alabama , † April 7, 1930 in Boston , Massachusetts ) was an American finance manager who was governor of the Federal Reserve System Committee between 1916 and 1922 .

Life

Harding, grandson of the portrait painter Chester Harding , began after attending school an undergraduate degree at the University of Alabama , which he graduated with a bachelor's degree in 1880 . He completed a subsequent postgraduate course at the University of Alabama in 1881 with a Masters , making him the youngest fully graduated student in the history of the university. He then began a career as a bank manager at J. H. Fitts and Co. in Tuscaloosa and then went to Birmingham , where he was an accountant and then a cashier at the Berney National Bank . He later served as Vice President and most recently Vice President of the First National Bank of Birmingham and, since 1913, financial advisor to Oscar Underwood , a Democratic member of the US House of Representatives from Alabama .

In August 1914, Harding was appointed to the newly created committee of the Federal Reserve System in Washington, DC and served on that body until August 1922. On August 10, 1916, he dissolved Charles S. Hamlin as governor of the Federal Reserve System and was thus the second chairman of this US central bank. During this time he also acted as managing director of the War Finance Corporation from 1918 to 1919 . On August 9, 1922, his tenure as governor of the Federal Reserve System ended, whereupon Daniel R. Crissinger took over on May 1, 1923. He himself traveled to Havana in August 1922 at the request of Alfredo Zayas y Alfonso , the President of Cuba , to advise the Cuban government on the reorganization of its financial and accounting system.

On his return to the United States, Harding was elected third governor and president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston in January 1923 and held that office until his death on April 7, 1930. In this position, he directed the practice of annual meetings of all member banks for the better Cooperation and understanding. He was also a proponent of giving member banks a larger share of the profits of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston by declaring higher dividends. He is considered a key figure in the founding years of the Federal Reserve System and wrote the book The formative period of the Federal Reserve System about this time in 1925 . During the world crisis . He died in office as the only President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston

publication

• The formative period of the Federal Reserve System. During the world crisis , Houghton, Mifflin Company, Boston 1925, reprint 1970, ISBN 0-4040-3107-2

Web links

• William Harding on the Federal Reserve System home page
• Entry in the Open Library