Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 177, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 July 1911 — Bank Uses Thumb Print Signatures [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Bank Uses Thumb Print Signatures

CHICAGO. —Chicago has a bank which identifies its depositors by means of the thumb print mark. When a customer who cannot write his name opens an account or deposits money or withdraws it he makes a thumb mark on the slip, and is sufficiently identified. According to the cashier of this peculiar bank, there has never been an error in the Bertlllon system of identification. When we began business pix years ago, he says, not more than one in three of our customers could sign his name in English. We would not accept signatures. in Jewish writing. We were confronted by a serious problem. The use of the thumb print was suggested, and it has worked out to perfect satisfaction. When a man comes in to open an account and we find he cannot sign his name'we fill in the identification

card for him, just as we would for any other depositor. Then we write his name and witness his mark. Then we give him an ordinary rubber stamp pad with red ink on it, and he presses first one thumb and then the other on the pad and makes a careful, clear impression of each on the corners of nis card. When the depositor comes back to add to his account or to withdraw money the bank attendant makes out the slip for him and writes in his name. Then the depositor makes his thumb print on the slip and presents it at the teller’s window. The teller turns to the card index and finds the card, just as he would for any other depositor. In place of looking at the signature he looks at the thumb prints and compares them with the marks on the deposit or withdrawal slip. We have never had a complaint or error from the use of this system. There are absolutely no two thumbs alike, and the thumb print mark is an absolute Identification. We have had complaints over signatures, but never over thumb prints. Men have claimed that they did not sign withdrawal slips, but no one has .ever denied his thumb mark.