Commercial National

As Peierls, Buhler & Co. sold out to Commercial Investment Trust Corp. last week (see p. 44), Peierls, Buhler's President Herbert P. Howell resigned. A greater opportunity, toward which he had assiduously worked, waited for him. Nonetheless he retained contact with the textile factors--as chairman . of its executive committee.

That greater opportunity was the presidency of a great new bank, the Commercial National Bank & Trust Co. of Manhattan.

Comptroller of the Treasury Joseph Wallace Mclntosh has only recently approved the creation of this bank. It has only temporary offices in Wall Street. But it actually has $14,000,000 of paid in capital and surplus, more money than any bank ever started with.* And it has Mr. Howell as its senior executive. Thirty years ago he was one of Carnegie's bright young men--with Charles Michael Schwab, Henry Clay Frick and others who became millionaires. Mr. Howell was head of the Carnegie Steel Co.'s credit department. Later he became a vice president of the National Bank of Commerce in Manhattan, and extended his personal financial work. Then came directorships with the Bankers' Trust Co., the Equitable Life Assurance Society of the U. S.

Money and the man guarantee the new Commercial National Bank & Trust Co. large activities. Its list of directors indicate a wide influence. It includes: Walter Percy Chrysler, Jacob France, Edward Phillip Farley, Sidney R. Kent, Clement M. Keys, David A. Schulte, William Wrigley Jr.

And it includes men of whom the general public rarely hears: William Henry Albers, president of the Kroger Grocery & Baking Co., a chain rapidly spreading over the country; Harold O. Barker of Jessup & Lament, classed in Wall Street with J. S. Bache & Co. as the largest of purely stock brokerage houses; John Hanes Jr. of Chas. D. Barney & Co., large brokerage and underwriting house; Robert Lehman of Lehman Bros.

*A bank with $20,000,000 initial resources is now being organized in Manhattan.