First Dakota National Bank of Yankton

The bank's first president had already drawn the lines Dakota was settled by. Moses K. Armstrong, born at Milan, Ohio, in 1832, came as a government surveyor and ran the meridian and standard lines for the federal survey of southern Dakota and the northern Red River Valley. He sat in the first territorial House in 1861, was its speaker in 1863 and later president of the council, and went to Congress as Dakota's delegate, a Democrat, from 1871 to 1875. Beaten in 1874, he moved to St. James, Minnesota, to bank, and died at Albert Lea in 1906.

What the plaque says

First Dakota National Bank of Yankton Dakota Territories first bank was that of Mark M. Parmer started at Yankton in Sep- tember, 1869 which became the private banking partnership of Parmer and Moses K. Armstrong in 1872. On December 27, 1872, the FIRST NATIONAL BANK OF YANKTON, a successor was chartered. Its first officers were: Moses K. Armstrong, Pres., L. D. Parmer, Vice-Pres., and Mark M. Parmer, Cashier. Its early business included that of the steamboat companies, the Indian and Military Depart- ments, the miners and freighters and a balancing gold scale was as important an adjunct as its ponderous safes. The first building, sketched above, was located on Second Street between Douglas and Walnut but in 1875 the Bank moved to this location. In 1909 the DAKOTA NATIONAL BANK was organized with the fol- lowing officers: F.C. Danforth, Pres., J. A. Danforth, Vice-Pres., Wm. J. Fantle, 2nd Vice-Pres., and Sig O. Hanger, Cashier. On October 1st, 1931 the FIRST NATIONAL and DAKOTA NATIONAL were merged as the FIRST DAKOTA NATIONAL BANK OF YANKTON. The Pioneer Bank of the two Dakotas.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Spirit Mound Historic Prairie — 22 mi
  A lone hill north of Vermillion that Lewis and Clark walked to on a scorching day in 1804, now one of the few places left where you can stand exactly where they stood.
• Santee Sioux Nation Museum — 23 mi
  The Isanti Dakota nation's museum and research room beside its headquarters at Santee, with census rolls from 1866, the mission school's photographs and a Dakota-language newspaper that ran for 68 years.

More markers nearby

• East Wall Yankton Stockade — steps away
• Yankton Stockade — steps away
• North Wall Yankton Stockade — steps away
• West Wall Yankton Stockade — steps away