Gregory DL Morris |
The presence of those American entities lives on in more than their names and legacies . BMO is not a corporate sponsor of the legendary hometown Montreal Canadiens , but rather their rival Chicago Blackhawks and also the Minnesota Wild . In basketball BMO plays the field , sponsoring the Toronto Raptors , the only NBA franchise in Canada , but also the Chicago Bulls and the Milwaukee Bucks .
It is notable that the founding of the first bank in Canada was made by articles of association and not charter . Those British North American colonies were — as had been the American colonies before — directly responsible to London . Their governance and operation was not for their own direct benefit , but for the good of the mercantilist system that supported the British Empire . Prohibitions against indigenous colonial currency were one of the grievances that led to the American Revolution . BMO did receive a formal charter in 1822 .
To put BMO ’ s founding into historical context , the Bank of North America was founded in Philadelphia in 1781 and Alexander Hamilton had helped found the Bank of New York in 1784 . Those were more than 30 years before BMO , but they were in response to dire circumstances of a newly-independent and deeply-indebted nation . The Bank of North America was formed after most of the fighting was over , but still two years before the treaty that ended the revolution . The Bank of New York was founded the year after the treaty .
The Bank of North America was succeeded by the First Bank of the United States in 1791 , but given BMO ’ s extensive cross-border activity from its inception , the Montreal institution could certainly be considered the bank of North America de facto if not de jure .
At the time of BMO ’ s founding , Canada was just getting back on its feet as well . The influx of loyalists fleeing the new United States had created an unstable political situation in His Majesty ’ s remaining North American colonies . That was sorted with the Constitutional Act of 1791 that redrew the boundaries of Quebec or Lower Canada ( not lesser , just downriver on the St . Lawrence ) and created Upper Canada , now the province of Ontario .
In the United States it is called the War of 1812 , but in Canada it is called the Anglo- American war . A good bit of the land fighting took place in Canada where Canadians ,
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$ 20 bank note from the Bank of Montreal , dated October 1817 , before the bank began business on November 3 , 1817 . The first notes were printed in Hartford , CT , where the bank then obtained the plates , bank note paper and press required for reproducing the notes in Montreal . |
Bank of Montreal stock certificates , like the one shown here , became a consequential type of document in the emerging economic and financial life of Canada . This certificate for two shares of stock is dated March 16 , 1839 . It is signed by Peter McGill , president of the bank , and countersigned by Benjamin Holmes , the bank ’ s cashier . |
Bank of Montreal
Bank of Montreal
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