Union National Bank

Union National Bank was the Kansas City, Missouri, bank where Harry S. Truman found better-paid work as an assistant teller before family circumstances drew him back to farming. The account presents the institution chiefly through this short but important episode in Truman’s early working life, rather than through a broader history of the bank.

Setting and Work

After the Bank of Commerce refused him another raise, Truman left and joined Union National Bank at Ninth and Baltimore, in the ten-story New York Life Building, whose main entrance was marked by a giant bronze eagle. The move brought a higher salary: he earned $75 a month, and, as an assistant teller, soon reached $100. Truman regarded the latter as a magnificent salary, and found the new bank a pleasanter place to work.

A Brief Period of Prosperity

The job formed part of a lively stretch in Truman’s life. Alongside the improved pay, he made new friends and attended National Guard drill sessions. He bought a Panama hat, had his photograph taken, and saw Sir Henry Irving and Ellen Terry perform The Merchant of Venice at Willis Wood Hall. These details place the bank job within a period of independence and activity, when Truman’s prospects seemed brighter than they had at his previous employment.

Departure and Significance

Truman’s banking career did not last. After his father, John Truman, lost the family’s corn crop to floods at Clinton and moved to the Blue Ridge farm, the demands of running the farm proved too much even with help from Vivian. Some four or five months after the family’s October 1905 move, Truman was told to quit his job and return home. The episode therefore marks both a step forward in his wage-earning life and its abrupt interruption: family responsibility took precedence over the promising work he had found at Union National Bank.