Clearing-House
2 of the 7 encyclopedias on this shelf carry an entry for Clearing-House. Both are reproduced below, so you can see where they agree and where they differ.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
a central office where representatives of different banks meet to exchange checks and drafts. At the close of a day's business each bank in a city finds that it holds checks upon the other banks for various amounts. Where there are but a few banks, a clerk goes out the next morning and presents these checks, but in cities with many banks the clerks meet as stated at a given hour, usually 9 A. M. A few minutes are quite sufficient to do the work that would otherwise require travel and expenditure of valuable time. In large clearing houses a desk is provided for each bank holding membership, also a central desk for a manager. Each bank is represented by two clerks. One takes a seat at the desk, the other passes around the circle delivering the bundles of checks which he holds against the various banks. A deposit slip or statement is delivered with each bundle of checks, and a general statement is handed to the manager. If a bank receives checks in excess of its total deposits, it pays the manager the balance in cash. If a bank deposits checks exceeding in value those received, it receives the balance in cash. If the accounts be correct, the manager receives precisely as much cash as he pays out. Fines are imposed for tardiness and inaccuracy. In the New York clearing house, consisting of sixty or more members, fortyfive minutes are allowed for the settlement of business that would otherwise require the time of many messengers and the transportation of enormous quantities of money with attendant risks and expenses. The manager of the New York clearing house, writing in the Americana in 1902, states that the daily clearings of the various cities of the United States , if made by messengers with coin, would require the transportation of 700 tons of the precious metals daily; while under the present system less than five per cent of the daily exchanges are settled in money. The system originated, it is claimed, in Edinburgh near the close of the eighteenth century. The earliest authentic records date from 1770 when the London bank clerks arranged for a meeting in an informal way at a central room to exchange deposits and pay balances. It is everywhere customary for the smaller banks, and country banks not members of the clearing house association, to make their deposits with banking members. American clearings for 101 cities in 1908 were $131,285,367,000. The Canadian clearings for the same year were $4,142,000,000. The following table, compiled by The American Banker, shows the volume of business done in the clearing houses of the principal cities of the United States for 1908. It shows New York to be the financial metropolis of the nation; Boston, of New England ; Chicago, of the Middle West; and San Francisco , of the Pacific States. Boston $7,338,035,825 Fall River 50,797,024 Hartford 166,906,324 Lowell 24,180,450 New Bedford 40,876,795 New Haven 123,102,818 Portland, Me 91,908,653 Providence 337,480,000 Springfield, Mass 92,490,212 Worcester 76,189,380 ----------------- Total New England $8,341,967,481 Albany $278,976,213 Baltimore 1,240,904,390 Binghamton 23,836,900 Buffalo 409,086,589 Chester 23,560,542 Greensburg 25,919,663 New York 79,275,880,256 Philadelphia 5,987,754,106 Pittsburg 2,064,632,959 Rochester 175,959,356 Syracuse 102,893,851 Washington 278,079,235 Wheeling 72,000,600 Wilmington, Del 61,727,836 --------------------- Total Eastern States $91,021,312,496 Atlanta $230,067,592 Augusta 83,838,140 Birmingham 93,945,498 Chattanooga 69,766,032 Fort Worth 508,491,520 Galveston 682,902,000 Houston 1,063,835,612 Jacksonville, Fla 73,194,127 Knoxville 71,654,489 Lexington 32,354,298 Little Rock 71,022,889 Louisville 579,863,327 Macon 36,237,094 Memphis 252,991,081 Nashville 153,675,903 New Orleans 786,097,353 Norfolk 111,079,245 Richmond 298,532,561 Savannah 194,180,377 Vicksburg 18,406,580 ------------------- Total Southern States $5,412,104,718 Akron $30,629,250 Bloomington 24,784,426 Canton 25,721,069 Chicago 11,853,814,943 Cincinnati 1,230,180,300 Cleveland 749,846,709 Columbus 253,756,600 Davenport 55,520,161 Dayton 81,235,277 Des Moines 147,746,846 Detroit 668,047,524 Evansville 93,965,445 Grand Rapids 106,803,257 Indianapolis 380,372,084 Jacksonville, Ill 12,937,920 Kalamazoo 50,520,060 Milwaukee 547,569,294 Minneapolis 1,057,468,860 Peoria 134,689,657 Quincy 25,696,053 Rockford 30,576,274 Sioux City 113,472,005 Sioux Falls 29,251,108 Springfield, Ill 43,082,990 Springfield, Ohio 20,125,550 St Joseph 259,340,258 St Louis 3,165,619,327 St Paul 483,976,978 Toledo 180,169,933 Youngstown 34,791,423 --------------------- Total Middle States $21,891,711,581 Colorado Springs $33,593,494 Denver 409,996,642 Fargo 30,894,939 Fremont 16,792,953 Kansas City 1,848,511,393 Omaha 602,525,867 Topeka 55,870,990 Wichita 72,948,070 ------------------- Total Western States $3,071,134,348 Helena $41,300,978 Los Angeles 505,588,756 Oklahoma City 52,635,058 Portland, Ore 310,656,513 Salt Lake City 257,033,974 San Francisco 1,757,151,850 Seattle 429,499,251 Spokane 307,791,482 Tacoma 218,058,600 ------------------- Total Pacific States . . . . . $3,879,716,462
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
a financial institution which makes daily adjustment of debits and credits among the banks constituting its membership. In the old days before the American clearing -houses were established, Bank No. 1 sent a runner to Bank No. 2 with the check to get it cashed; and if No. 2 had a check on No. 1, it sent its runner over; and so on, all through all the banks. But now each morning the clearing-house clerks of a bank report at the clearinghouse, and make out a list of all the checks payable to that bank by or through other banks; then the clearinghouse people take these lists, and compare them. They find, for instance, that Bank A owes B $ 1,000 and C $500; that B owes A $500 and C $1,000, and that C owes A $500 and B $ 500. Comparing these, we see that A owes B $500 clear CLÉMENCEAU minute solids, regularly terminated. The directions in which such bodies thus break up are called their planes of cleavcubic, diagonal, or lateral (or peritoage; and the cleavage is called basal, mous), according as it is parallel to the base of a crystal, to the faces of a cube, to a diagonal plane, or to the lateral planes. In certain rocks again there is may coincide with the original plane of a tendency to split along planes which stratification , but which more frequently is the consequence of the readjustment crosses it at an angle. This tendency by pressure and heat of the components of rocks, which is one of the phases of metamorphism . county-seat of Johnson co. Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe, the Trin-