The Panic of 1907
How Lewis Levi Painter got his money out of a closed bank
Written by a grandchild of Lewis Levi Painter — author not yet identified
Subject: Lewis Levi Painter, who signed himself L.L. Painter
Event: The Panic of 1907, fall of that year
Place: The Painter ranch on the Little Missouri River, Harding County, South Dakota; Belle Fourche, South Dakota
Told by: Joe Painter, born November 1902, son of L.L. Painter
Written by: A grandchild of L.L. Painter and a nephew or niece of Joe Painter
Submitted by: Melinda Painter
Date written: Not stated
This is a family account of the autumn of 1907, written down by one of Lewis Levi Painter’s grandchildren and heard many times from Joe Painter, L.L.’s son. It begins with a short lesson on what a bank panic was and ends with a bank teller being throttled through the bars of his cage. What follows is the account as written.
The Story
In the year 1907, there occurred what was called a panic. This was before the creation of the Federal Reserve Banks. Panics were one of the reasons the Federal Reserve Banks were created.
Panics occurred because of a shortage in the money supply of the USA. In a panic, most people had to do most of their business by barter or trade. You could not buy, sell, or borrow money. Everyone who had money held on to it or hoarded it. So much for the economic lesson and on to my story.
Sometime in the fall of 1907, Grandfather Lewis Levi Painter and some of his neighbors gathered a herd of cattle to take to market. At that time the closest shipping point to his Harding County, South Dakota Ranch on the Little Missouri River was at Belle Fourche. They were probably shipping to Chicago; Belle Fourche is about 70 or 80 air miles from the ranch.
This story was narrated by Uncle Joe Painter, the eldest son of L.L. Painter (this is how he signed his name). This story usually began by Joe (he was born in November, 1902) telling how he and his Mother, May Bovell Painter could see the big steers come rolling off the big divide south of their homestead. For sure the cattle were so glad to be home that they probably stampeded coming off that ridge. At that time they kept their beef steers until they were three year olds. The longhorn breeding probably still was very apparent, and they undoubtedly were horned as well. It must have been a very colorful sight!
Grandma Painter and Uncle Joe could not imagine what was going on. They thought the cattle should have been shipped and sold by then. They did not expect to see the mounted horsemen and the chuck wagon returning. They did not know anything about the panic beforehand, so the whole situation was a great shock to them.
Of course, they were full of questions as soon as they could ask Grandpa why he brought the cattle home. He explained about the panic and why he could not ship their cattle. The railroad would not even load them because there was no market. Railroads always wanted the freight paid in advance. If cattle prices were good enough to pay the freight, they let people ship them and take the money for the freight from the shipper’s proceeds. This was all handled by the commission firm, so the railroad was sure to get paid.
Grandpa didn’t know what to do, he couldn’t ship the cattle, and he didn’t want to go home without the supplies they needed for winter. The Milwaukee Railroad did not come to southwestern North Dakota until 1910, so Belle Fourche or Dickinson, North Dakota were the closest places where needed supplies were available at reasonable prices and in any quantity.
They had some food and bed rolls in the chuck wagon, so they just camped along the Belle Fourche River with the cattle. While the other men herded the cattle, 
Grandpa would go into town to the bank, and visit the teller. He had a least $300 on deposit in the bank, but they would not let him withdraw it.
The teller was behind a cage, and wore a vest with a stiff collar and a necktie. Grandpa would lean on the counter and visit with him about everything he could think of. He was evidently trying to bore the poor fellow to death. One warm afternoon after this visit went on; the teller started to get sleepy and began to lean closer and closer to the bars of his cage.
Grandpa had a reputation for being very quick and agile. When the teller leaned close enough, he grabbed him with one hand by the collar and tie and began to choke him. Grandpa told the man that if he didn’t give him the money in his account, he would choke him to death. The money was soon forth coming. I would assume he didn’t let the man go until he had his money in hand. He surely didn’t let him go to the vault to get it. In retrospect, I am surprised there was money in the cash drawer under the counter!
Grandpa then bought supplies for himself and others who were with him. The details of how Grandpa withdrew his money from the bank did not come to light right away. He was modest enough that he didn’t tell my Grandmother all the details. She found out later from the others who were along with him.
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Transcription Notes
The text above is reproduced exactly as received, in two typed pages. Spelling, punctuation, and sentence construction are the author’s and have been left alone — including He had a least $300, forth coming as two words, and the runs of exclamation points. Nothing has been corrected, smoothed, or added. The two pages are continuous; the first ends mid‑sentence at Grandpa would go into and the second resumes at town to the bank. That paragraph has been joined here.
— The author is not named. See the section below.
— No date of composition. The account was typed, not handwritten, and refers to the Federal Reserve in the past tense, which places it well after the event but no closer.
— Neither the bank nor the teller is named. The town is unnamed as well, though the context is Belle Fourche.
— “May Bovell Painter” — the spelling here agrees with the 1906 letter and with Cathy Dodd’s usage. It is not Borell.
Who Wrote This
The author is not identified, and the question is open. What the document itself establishes:
— A grandchild of Lewis Levi Painter. He is a Painter Grandfather; May Bovell Painter is Grandma Painter.
— Not one of Joe’s children. Joe is Uncle Joe Painter. Lewis and May had three sons — Preston, Frederick, and Joe — so the author is a child of Preston or of Frederick.
— Old enough to have heard Joe tell the story repeatedly, and close enough to him to have heard it many times.
— A person who knows the cattle business from the inside. Three‑year‑old beef steers, visible longhorn breeding, freight paid in advance, the commission firm standing between shipper and railroad — this is not researched detail.
— Careful about how L.L. Painter signed his name, and careful to mark inference as inference: I am sure, I would assume, he surely didn’t, in retrospect.
That last habit is the reason this document can be trusted as far as it goes. The author separates what Joe told him from what he himself supposes, and never lets the second pass as the first.
The parenthetical about the signature is suggestive. The same concern — getting L.L. Painter’s name recorded the way he wrote it — drove the family’s 2014 effort to correct South Dakota Magazine, which makes Bob Painter, eldest of Preston and Marion Cranston Painter’s nine children, the first candidate. He is not the only one. Any grandchild through Preston or Frederick fits the evidence, and the family historian known to us as Cindy Painter fits it as well.
If you can help settle it, we would be glad to hear from you. The surest tell is the writing itself — the strings of seven exclamation points appear twice. Anyone who recognizes that habit knows the author.
What This Document Adds
Joe Painter’s birth month and year. November 1902, stated plainly. That is a new fixed point in the Painter record.
A direct conflict on the birth order. This account calls Joe the eldest son of L.L. Painter. Other material in this archive has Preston as the eldest. Both cannot stand. Joe’s November 1902 date is now firm; Preston’s is needed to close the question, and it matters — it bears on who ran what, and on a line in the companion post about Lewis Painter’s name.
The geography of the ranch economy. The Painter place on the Little Missouri lay seventy or eighty air miles from its nearest railhead. Cattle walked to Belle Fourche and winter supplies walked back. When the railhead failed, the whole year failed with it.
A portrait of the man. The Lewis Painter of the 1906 letter is anxious and careful — counting what is left in the bank, reminding his wife twice about the insurance. The Lewis Painter of 1907 spends several afternoons boring a teller into drowsiness and then takes him by the throat. Both are the same man, eighteen months apart, and the family kept both stories.
Historical Notes
The panic was real and the timing is right. The Panic of 1907 broke in October and ran through the fall. Banks across the country suspended cash payments — depositors could not draw their own balances, and currency effectively disappeared from circulation. The author’s account of barter and hoarding is a plain description of what that felt like on the ground. The Federal Reserve System was created in 1913, and the 1907 panic was among the principal reasons for it.
The teller was probably not being arbitrary. He was almost certainly following his bank’s suspension policy, which was general and lawful at the time. The author half‑sees this himself — hence the surprise that there was cash in the drawer at all.
Belle Fourche as the shipping point is correct. It was one of the great cattle shipping towns of the northern plains in this period.
The Milwaukee Railroad date is the one claim worth flagging. The author gives 1910 for the Milwaukee’s arrival in southwestern North Dakota. Standard histories put the Milwaukee’s main line across that corner of the state in 1907, with a branch from McLaughlin, South Dakota to New England, North Dakota laid in 1911. The author may have had the branch in mind, or the date a usable stock‑loading point actually existed within reach of the ranch. Either way the story’s logic holds: in the fall of 1907 Belle Fourche was still where the Painter cattle had to go.
Transcribed and formatted for thecranstonline.com. Author unidentified; attribution will be added when established. Submitted by Melinda Painter.