Los Angeles County, CA, Biographies

This file is part of the California Genealogy & History Archives 
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~cagha/index.htm


A. D. CHILDRESS
THE CHILDRESS SAFE DEPOSIT BANK, 
 
though young in years, ranks prominently among the great financial institutions 
for which Los Angeles is famous.  It was established under the banking laws of 
the State, by W. T. and A. D. Childress, and opened its doors for business at 
No. 37 South Spring street in July, 1886. The banking rooms, which are admirably 
adapted for the purpose, are furnished with a large safe-deposit vault so 
constructed as to offer absolute safety and protection to the patrons of the 
bank against both fire and burglars. The top, bottom and sides are made of 
chrome steel and iron welded and bolted together, of such combination and 
thickness as to render the structure entirely proof against burglars. The door 
is a massive affair equally impervious to the tools of the "cracksmen," and is 
secured by two Diebold's patent cut-off spindle combination locks, and the 
celebrated Yale time-lock. The vault has a capacity for 1,000 boxes made of 
welded steel and iron, with doors of the same material and extra thickness, and 
fitted with the latest improved safe-deposit locks, each supplied with two keys, 
a "master key" being held by the bank, which must first be inserted before the 
renter can gain access to the box with his private key. The key to each private 
vault is entirely different from every other key, thus rendering access to it by 
any other key than the one designed for it utterly impossible. By prescribed 
rules of the bank the customer must be identified as having the right to enter 
the vault before he is permitted to do so. The bank imparts no information as to 
who are depositors or renters or its business transactions with them. Ample room 
is furnished the patrons for the examination of the contents of their boxes, 
without the risk of carrying them through the streets. For executors, guardians, 
trustees and private individuals these private safes are very convenient and 
afford perfect protection to papers and other valuables at a nominal expense to 
the renter. The Childress Safe Deposit Bank also does general commercial banking 
business, buys and sells exchange, etc. Mr. A. D. Childress, who has active 
management of the bank, has been in the banking business over thirteen years, 
and is thoroughly familiar with every branch of it. As an indication of his 
devotion to the bank's interest, in three years and a half since it was opened 
he has only been absent from it during banking hours once long enough to make a 
business trip to San Francisco and return. He is a native of Tennessee and was 
twenty-nine years of age his last birthday. His father and partner, W. T. 
Childress, is an Alabamian by birth, and spent fifteen years in banking life in 
Terrell and Sulphur Springs, Texas, before they moved to Los Angeles in 1885. 
Although retired from active business he has extensive financial interests in 
Los Angeles besides the bank. He is now sixty-seven years of age.
 
An Illustrated History of Los Angeles County, California �  Chicago, The Lewis 
Publishing Company, 1889   Page 435
Transcribed by Kathy Sedler