First National Proud: A century of change (and bills) at Alaska's family-owned bank.

• Author: Rhode, Scott
• Position: CORPORATE 100

The fireworks display over Anchorage on January 30 was too late for New Year's Eve, too early for Fur Rendezvous. What was it for? The fact that it happened at Cuddy Family Midtown Park is a clue, for those who know the history of the Cuddy family and what happened on that day 100 years earlier.

The Cuddy family has run First National Bank Alaska (FNBA) since 1941, and the institution was already nineteen years old by then. Started on January 30, 1922, as The First National Bank of Anchorage inside a furniture store at 4th Avenue and G Street, FNBA has grown and prospered over the last century while other banks have fallen by the wayside or been absorbed by larger institutions.

Don't confuse FNBA with National Bank of Alaska (NBA), started in Skagway in 1916. Led by the Rasmuson family, NBA used to be Alaska's largest bank, but it never marked its hundredth birthday. Wells Fargo bought NBA in 2000, a couple years after the San Francisco-based Gold Rush bank was itself bought by Minneapolis-based Norwest Corporation, a bank that will celebrate its centennial in 2029.

First National changed its 'A' in 2001. "I was here when the bank transitioned from The First National Bank of Anchorage to First National Bank Alaska," says Chief Administrative Officer Cheri Gillian. "When Wells Fargo purchased NBA, we were like 'Okay, now we get to be First National Bank Alaska."

Given that NBA did not obtain a national charter until 1950, FNBA has a strong claim to really be the first national bank in Alaska. "First" has been part of its identity, says Board Chair and CEO Betsy Lawer. FNBA had the first drive-through window and computerized banking in Alaska, both in 1960. A year later, it opened the first branch in Bethel, the only bank for an area the size of Montana. The first bank branch inside a US federal building was FNBA's in Anchorage in 1980. And FNBA ranked first in the nation for return on assets in 1984, 1985, and 1986.

That's a lot of firsts.

Family Values

The first countertop at FNBA's flagship location in downtown Anchorage was a slab of marble from a candy kitchen. Winfield Ervin furnished his new bank with salvage from his candy factory in Idaho. Across that counter slid assets from Ervin's early customers: railroad workers, fur trappers, and gold miners.

Lawer recalls seeing gold nuggets weighed on a scale in the bank. "Then the gold would be put in the vault as collateral, along with pelts. The challenge was the pelts were often stinky,"...