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 On 1 November 1968 Martins Bank
Limited becomes one of the Barclays Group of Companies – a status maintained
until close of Business on Friday 12 December 1969. The following Monday, 730 branches of the
bank will open their doors under the name of Barclays. As we find ourselves in times tinged with
the sadness of the closure of hundreds of Bank Branches, including those that
are former Martins Bank Branches, we
really do appreciate the continued
support of our ever increasing band of loyal visitors and contributors. There are now fewer than 80 Branches of
Martins Bank still open, and to mark their passing, our Branch Watch feature
now includes a separate page featuring details of THE LAST 64 BRANCHES . Our most recent news
stories are shown below, and you can catch up with some previous stories
in-depth, by downloading our half-yearly Newsletters (see above). Don’t forget to visit our sister site -
Lewis’s Bank Archive - which tells the story of Britain’s department store
bank for the nine years that it was a subsidiary of Martins Bank. Click HERE to
visit the Lewis’s Bank Archive web site (opens in a new window).
More
Branch closures…
The next round of BRANCH
CLOSURES to
affect former branches of Martins Bank, has been announced by Barclays. So
far we know of FOUR branches, some of them key to the history of the Bank - Liverpool
University on 29 Jan 2021 and Lancaster University also closing 29 Jan 2021, were
the first and the last of Martins’ university outlets to be opened. Liverpool University began the experiment
of Student Banking in this country in 1958, and by 1988 competition amongst
the banks for the student market saw bank branches on just about every university
campus in the country. Also closing
are Moreton (Cheshire)
13 Jan 2021, and West Kirby 15 Jan
2021.
 
  By establishing a sub-branch
at the Centre Court of the All England Club at Wimbledon in 1930, Martins
Bank shows that despite being what some disdainfully referred to as a
“regional bank”, it can still pack a punch in the heartland of many a
“national bank”. The prestige of being
able to offer a full banking service each year to players and visitors, is
something in which Martins unboubtedly revels. Advertising a service which is only
available in one place for just two weeks out of every year is largely
confined to the Official Programme of the All England Club. Alongside advertisements for the latest
tennis equipment and clothing, alcohol and smoking paraphernalia, the Bank
takes out half a page – that’s approximately 9 by 6 inches’ worth of space to
remind Wimbledon staff players and spectators that they can have access to
money each day from 12 noon (11:30 am in later years) until close of play on
each day of the tournament. By the
time of the merger with Barclays, the importance of the Wimbledon sub-branch
to the bank is such that a joint Barclays/Martins advert appears in the 1969
Programme. Although a few
advertisements are produced with Centre Court imagery, many are themed simply
using the Bank’s latest campaign, with the addition of a small text box which
provides details of the specific service available during the tournament. For
the first time, we are able to bring together a set of Centre Court
sub-Branch adverts which broadly covers the period 1952 to 1969. The 1959
advert, featuring the holiday choice of “Miss Travers” actually bears NO
Wimbledon-specific wording at all, yet it is printed in the Official
Programme…
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1952
–the Stagecoach Era campaign
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1954–the
Stagecoach Era campaign
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1956
– the Decentralised nature of the Bank Campaign
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1958
– Martins Makes me feel like a Millionnaire campaign
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1959
– Thinking about Money Campaign
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The
final use of a short-lived Martins Bank logo - 1960
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1961,
1962, 1963, 1964
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1965
– the liver Bird is dropped in favour of the grasshopper only logo
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A
slight variation in wording – 1966, 1967, 1968
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1969
– Barclays is able to get in on the act
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Looking
back a little further…
 The latest Martins Bank Archive
newsletter is now available, and for our Autumn/Winter 2020 edition we have
chosen to focus on the constiuent bank that brought about the change of name
to Martins Bank Limited in 1928. On 3
January 1928 the amalgamation of the Bank of Liverpool and Martins with the
Lancashire and Yorkshire Bank created the largest clearing bank outside
London, but with a catch. The directors of the Lancashire and Yorkshire were
not too pleased at having to lose the name of their bank entirely, and
insisted on a compromise – if the words Lancashire and Yorkshire
were to go, so too must the word Liverpool. The rest as they is
history, and the resulting “Martins Bank Ltd” was a neat compromise, and gave
us the bank that we celebrate here within the 1200 pages of the online
Archive. Over the last thirty years,
our Archive has collected around 2000 “physical” items – what is referred to
these days as memorabilia, and inevitably some of these items relate to the
banks that came together in the origin and growth of Martins Bank. The legacy of Lancashire and Yorkshire Bank
includes many fine buildings across the north of England, and in spirit, the
ethos of Martins Bank Magazine came in a large part from the Lancashire and
Yorkshire Bank Club Magazine. Our
newsletter shows many of our archived items that relate to the L and Y Bank,
and we think they demonstrate the modern outlook that was continued in
Martins Bank. You can download the
newsletter by clicking on the image above.
Dinner,
anyone?
 The various dinners that were
held in 2019 to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the merger of Martins
Bank’s Branches with those of Barclays, continue a long tradition that once
put a “firm date” in the social calendar of just about every bank clerk in
the land. Once a year, the staff of
the nine districts of Martins Bank would get together for a formal dinner, or
dance or sometimes both. The Archive
contains a wealth of information about these events, but surprisingly few
photographs. Thanks to the donation of
a large number of menu cards, and a few photographs, we have at last been
able to add a new page to the web site, which recalls MARTINS BANK’S DISTRICT DINNERS AND DANCES from their establishment at
the end of World War Two, up to the late 1960s and the merger with
Barclays. There are however still
many, gaps in the records, with very few photographs of events in the
Northern, Craven and South Western Districts. If you can help with memories,
menus, tickets or photographs of Martins Bank’s District dinners and/or
dances, please do get in touch with us at the usual address – gutinfo@btinternet.com or leave a
message on our Facebook® page.
From
World War to Pandemic…
 Much of the World is still
working round the clock to beat the effects of the Covid 19 virus, and to
bring it under some kind of control. We wish good health and happiness to all
our visitors, and to the many hundreds of thousands of health workers,
carers, volunteers and key workers, we offer admiration and gratitude. May 2020 marks the seventy-fifth
anniversary of Victory in Europe, and despite the people of Britain once more
having to show restraint, courage, resolve and fortitude in the face of an
invisible enemy, people of all ages and from all over this country showed
their respect and gratitude to the generation that fought so hard to bring
peace to Europe. For our spring/Summer
Newsletter, we have selected a number of stories which represent the
involvement of Martins Bank and its predecessors, and the roles of the Bank’s
staff in wartime.
The First World War brings us stories of
courage and promotion, a member of staff wounded but safe in hospital, and
the sadness and poignancy of a letter of condolence following the loss of a
young soldier. From records of the Second World War, we look again at the key
role played by the Bank in looking after some of Britain’s reserves of gold,
and we look at two patriotic advertisements for the Bank, aimed at
re-starting trade with the rest of the World.
We take a trip to the Lake District where a very special building is
equipped as a kind of “haven” for staff who need a break from the horrors of
war – the Ambleside Rest House, an asset prized by Staff and their
families. Using information held
within the Martins Bank Staff Database, we examine the Bank’s decision to
employ a large number of its female staff to be Managers (in all but name) of
Branches whilst the male staff were away fighting for King and Country. We look at the Branches which were damaged,
or destroyed by enemy acgtion, including the devastation at Exeter – a branch
that had only been open for three years – bombed in the infamous Baedecker
Air Raids of April 1942. We meet a polymath with a top-secret role, and
glimpse the Bank’s preparations for “business as usual”. We pause to reflect on the efforts of some
who worked for, or fought and died to create, a better future for us all, and
finally as the World picks up the pieces, the Bank looks to a new future and
the prospect of the 1948 London Olympic Games. Click on the image shown here (right) to
read and/or download the newsletter.
Another
mystery to solve…
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A
mystery branch – but where is it?
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Once again we have stumbled
across a mystery branch of Martins Bank.
This recently acquired photograph (LEFT) which appears to have been taken in the
1940s or 50s shows quite clearly that a temporary branch has been opened on
this busy looking street of shops, but that it just about all we have to go
on. It was of course common for Martins either to arrive in a new town with
a temporary branch, whilst permanent premises were being finalised, built
or altered for the purpose of banking. Temporary branches were also used
when an existing branch needed to be given a complete makeover or
demolished and rebuilt.
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56
Fawcett St Sunderland 1963
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The smaller photograph here
(RIGHT) shows such a branch,
emblazened with the words “Temporary Premises” at Sunderland Fawcett Street
in the early 1960s. Our mystery branch appears to have a tobacconist shop
on one side and some kind of clothing shop on the other. That’s all we know
for now, so if you can help us track down the location, please do get in
touch at the usual address: gutinfo@btinternet.com
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Buyer Beware…
We
have left the following article here once again for reference, to help
explain the position regarding the theft of copyrighted images for the
purposes of re-sale. There is a common misconception that if you
can Google an image, then it is “in the public domain” and you can do what
you want with it. Even some staff at eBay® believed this until they were
recently put right – if you take or copy
someone else’s work or property without their permission or acknowledgement, and sell it on to make even a penny out
of it, this is breach of copyright, and the real owner can take legal
recourse to stop further theft and misuse of their property. There are currently on eBay® a number of listings of photographs for
sale, showing scenes from the past and old buildings including these four
(and many more) Branches of Martins Bank.
These images originated on our web site. As you can see, under our agreement with
the owner, we prominently display copyright. These images have been copied
and printed onto cheap photographic paper. The seller even has the gall to
add their own watermark to the displayed images to prevent others from
stealing them!!!
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STAINLAND
Image © Barclays
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SITTINGBOURNE
Image created by Martins Bank
Archive and © Barclays
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BURTON UPON TRENT
Image © Barclays
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WALLASEY
Image © Barclays
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As well as being against copyright law, these
items are worthless, having little more than sentimental value – you will
often find that collections and archives will make images available free of
charge for private use, but you MUST check with them first. You should always
check the seller’s right to copy the image – reputable sites such as eBay® do
now allow you to report copyright infringement. For ANY item of memorabilia,
the best thing to do is shop around and compare prices – in the case of
Martins Bank there are often up to twenty different items for sale on eBay®
alone on any given day. For printed material which looks as if it has been
copied, or actually claims to be a copy, ALWAYS question the seller about
copyright.
Best Regards, Jonathan.
Westmorland, Saturday 31 October 2020
WHILST MARTINS BANK
ARCHIVE HAS NO CONNECTION WITH THE DAY TO DAY TRADING ACTIVITIES OF THE
BARCLAYS GROUP OF
COMPANIES, WE ARE GRATEFUL FOR THE CONTINUED GENEROUS GUIDANCE, ADVICE
AND SUPPORT OF BARCLAYS
GROUP ARCHIVES IN THE BUILDING AND SHAPING OF THIS ONLINE SOCIAL HISTORY.
 R
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