History
The State Bank of Alcester began in late December of 1890 when F. E. Watkins and his associates started a private bank called the First State Bank in Alcester. A bank was needed to eliminate the risk involved in transporting money over land from nearby Hawarden, IA. Alcester was then a small, but ambitious, unincorporated town with several businesses needing money for transactions. For three years this bank operated without any fixed capital, with the owners advancing the necessary money as it was needed. On Jan. 1, 1894, it was organized as a state bank with capital of $5,000 and named the State Bank of Alcester. Individual deposits first reached the $5,000 mark on March 5, 1897. In 1919 E. F. McKellips and his father H. F. McKellips, purchased the Watkins stock holdings in this Alcester bank, making it for the first time a completely home-owned and home-managed bank. The bank has been in the McKellips family since that time. Member FDIC. Equal Housing Lender.