A Brief History of the Federal Reserve Bank
Francis Mayer / Corbis
Father of the Fed
The modern federal banking system traces its origins to 1791, when Congress, at the urging of Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton, established the First Bank of the United States. Headquartered in Philadelphia, the bank was given a twenty year charter, but many agrarian-minded Americans, uncomfortable with the idea of a large and powerful central bank, opposed it and Congress refused — by one vote — to renew it in 1811.
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