I always enjoy visiting with bankers at the state conventions, but I would be remiss if I didn’t acknowledge a special place in my heart for the Minnesota Bankers Association, where I worked as communications director from 1989 to 1991. MBA hosted it’s 120th annual convention at Madden’s Resort on Gull Lake near the Brainerd in central Minnesota earlier this week. I was fortunate enough to be able to spend a day at the convention, listening to speakers and visiting with MBA members and staff.

We will have coverage of the convention in the July 15 edition of NorthWestern Financial Review.

I can’t believe it has been 20 years since the MBA celebrated its 100th anniversary. I remember that convention well. I was still working as editor of this magazine at the time. To preview the convention in our May 20, 1989 edition, I did a big interview with Truman Jeffers, the long-time executive vice president of the MBA. Our meeting coverage ran a month later,in the June 17 edition. There were some 1,400 people at that convention, conducted in Saint Paul at the Radisson Hotel.

L. William Seidman, who was chairman of the FDIC at the time, was the keynote speaker. Seidman noted that the pace of mergers and acquisitions in Minnesota exceeded the national average during the late 1980s. He also praised steps taken in the late 1980s to move Minnesota from a unit banking state to a state that accommodated interstate banking.

Seidman said at the time: “Although Minnesota is a unit banking state, five detached facilities may now be established within 100 miles of the main office, and greater expansion can be facilitated through mergers. This is a good start, but I hope to see even more liberal intrastate rules down the road. Unit banking laws have been one of the factors that have contributed to the banking problems of the last few years by limiting efforts to diversity risk and avoid concentration.”

Bill Sands, president of Western Bank in Saint Paul, was president of MBA in 1988-89. During his speech at the convention, he said MBA had made great strides in working cooperatively with the Independent Bankers of Minnesota.

The convention featured many other well-known personalities as speakers, including Debora Howell, who was the editor of the Saint Paul Pioneer Press/Dispatch newspaper, Bart Star, the former NFL player and coach, and former Minnesota Governor Elmer Andersen.

One of the convention highlights was a speech from another former governor, Harold E. Stassen, who, amazingly, also addressed the MBA convention on its 50th anniversary! Another interesting speech came via taped telephone message from Henry G. Borgerding of North American State Bank in Belgrade, Minn. Like the MBA, Borgerding was celebrating his 100th birthday in 1989. And so was North American State Bank!

Jim Hearon, president of National City Bank in Minneapolis, was named MBA president at that convention for the 1989-90 year. I left NorthWestern Financial Review in September 1989 to work for MBA as communications director. Jim and I worked together quite a bit during his presidency. I appreciated working with Jim; he opened a lot of doors for me in my profession.