ABC Wednesday:Y is for Yorkshire Bank

The Hyde branch of the Yorkshire Bank is on Market Street in the Town Hall Buildings sandwiched now between the Chicken Hut and Subway.

Check out the 1990 view on Old Hyde and you'll notice that it had different neighbours twenty years ago. The shop above was Etcetera which I think was a ladies dress and accessories shop. The shop below was Granada TV Sales & Rentals and to the right of that was Greenwoods Gents Outfitters.

According to Wikipedia

the bank was established on 1 May 1859 by Colonel Edward Akroyd of Halifax. Based in Leeds it was known as the West Riding Penny Savings Bank. It had originally been planned as a provident society but the status of savings bank was eventually chosen. ... The bank was operated on a non-profit making basis and in 1860 it was decided to extend operation to the other ridings of Yorkshire {and later obviously to surrounding counties}.

To recognise this the name was changed to the Yorkshire Penny Bank. In 1872 it issued cheque books for the first time, primarily for small tradesmen. At that time the bank became the first to create school banks, to encourage the idea of saving at an early age. {I recall as a child having a number of savings boxes and piggy-banks donated by the YPB}

... In its centenary year of 1959 the bank's name changed to the more familiar Yorkshire Bank Limited. During the 1970s the bank became one of the first to offer fee-free banking whilst in credit, a move that took bigger rivals a decade to follow. In 1982 it adopted public limited company status.

In 1990 it was acquired by the National Australia Bank who in 2005 announced its intention to merge the Yorkshire Bank with the Clydesdale under one operating licence, in which the former would be a trading name of the latter. Both operate under separate identities although the Clydesdale brand is the one that has been used in further expansion into the south of England.

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