WASHINGTON, Jan. 7, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Following is the daily "Profile America" feature from the U.S. Census Bureau:

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MONDAY, JANUARY 7: FIRST U.S. BANK

Profile America — Monday, January 7th.  During the Revolutionary War, the rebelling colonies and the Continental Congress were anything but too big to fail.  To the contrary, finances were very spotty and precarious.  To help put affairs in order and make credit available, the first commercial bank in the U.S. opened this day in 1782, just a week after being chartered by the Congress.  Called the Bank of North America, it was capitalized at $400,000.  The names of founding stockholders read like a list of our Founding Fathers: Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, James Monroe, John Jay, and John Paul Jones.  Today there are over 91,000 commercial banking establishments in the U.S.  You can find more facts about America from the U.S. Census Bureau, online at www.census.gov.

Sources:  440 International Calendar of Events, Those Were the Days
2007 Economic Census, NAICS 52

Profile America is produced by the Center for New Media and Promotions of the U.S. Census Bureau. These daily features are available as produced segments, ready to air, on a monthly CD or on the Internet at http://www.census.gov (look for "Multimedia Gallery" by the "Newsroom" button). 

SOURCE U.S. Census Bureau