In 1954 there were only three banks in Montgomery, and all three sat side by side on Commerce Street downtown. That year two of the three, First National and Union, began a race to build the first branch bank. PT&N Architects saddled up with First, and SS&A Architects was hired by Union. Somehow I remember First National won by a month, but then I was on the PT&N design team back then. Thus I say this was First National’s rendition of the first branch in our city. It had two drive-up teller windows , and a concrete tunnel connected the remote window so the tellers could not be readily confronted by bank robbers. The concept that bank customers could actually drive up to the teller windows without hitting the slide-out apparatus was difficult to accept. Mind you, most of us were still trying to master drive-up movies, and did that many customers really own cars? But, the building is still here, exactly like we laid it out almost 60 years ago.

-Charles Humphries