Wachovia Bank Corporation - 1971

Beautifully engraved certificate from the Wachovia Corporation issued in 1971. This historic document was printed by the American Banknote Company and has an ornate border around it with a vignette of an allegorical woman holding a globe with a city in the background. This item has the printed signatures of the Company's President and Secretary and is over 38 years old.


Certificate Vignette

Wachovia, based in Charlotte, North Carolina, is a diversified, wholly owned financial services subsidiary of Wells Fargo. As an independent company, it was the fourth-largest bank holding company in the United States based on total assets.

The purchase of Wachovia Corporation by Wells Fargo was completed on December 31, 2008. Wells Fargo purchased Wachovia after a government-forced sale to avoid a failure of Wachovia.

Starting in 2009, the Wachovia brand will be absorbed into the Wells Fargo brand in a process that was initially estimated to last three years. In July 2009, Wachovia Securities became Wells Fargo Advisors. The merger of Wells Fargo and Wachovia bank charters is scheduled for completion in March 2010.

Throughout its history, Wachovia has produced long-term profitable growth while adapting to change and maintaining its core philosophy of operating in a sound and prudent manner.

Wachovia Corporation's common shares are traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol WB, and Wachovia is included in the Standard & Poor's 500 index.

The principal banking subsidiary is Wachovia Bank, N.A. Wachovia Bank has more than 650 offices and 1,350 ATMs in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia. Wachovia serves 3.8 million consumers and 200,000 small business and business banking customers in the five states. Wachovia is a leading corporate bank with more than 28,000 business relationships and global activities in 40 countries. An emphasis on building long-term customer relationships — highlighted by the introduction of the Personal Banker program in the early 1970s — is a hallmark of Wachovia.

The name "Wachovia" — pronounced wah-KO-vee-yah — is the English form of the German word "Wachau" given by Moravian colonists in 1753 to the tract of land they acquired in what is now the Piedmont region of North Carolina.

The name was chosen because the land's abundant streams and green pastures resembled a valley along the Danube River known as "Der Wachau" — ancestral home of the Moravians' benefactor, Count Zinzendorf. The community the Moravian settlers established in the Wachovia tract was named Salem.

In 1879, when the 13-year-old Bank of Salem moved a few blocks away to the community of Winston, the bank reopened under a new charter with a new name — Wachovia National Bank. Fourteen years later, Wachovia Loan and Trust Company opened across the street. The two banks merged in 1911 and evolved through the years through merger and expansion to become today's Wachovia organization.

History from Wikipedia and OldCompanyResearch.com.