Category:Liberty Bank and Trust Company, Allentown, Pennsylvania

The Liberty Trust Company of Allentown was first chartered in December 1918, and opened its first office in the Commonweatlh building in March 1919. while a bank building was being built. It moved into its permanant offices at 830 Hamilton Street in September 1919. In 1922, it's Independence Hall architecture was added with a clock and a cupola to the top of the buildings. Also, a 1,000 pound bell was included that rang each hour. The bell rang until World War II, when it was silenced. In 1925, Liberty Trust joined the Federal Reserve.

During the Great Deparession on March 6, 1933, all banks in the nation were forced to close by President Franklin Roosevelt, who declared a "Bank Holiday". Upon examination of its assets by the Federal Government, the Liberty Trust was ordered to assign its savings and checking deposits to the Lehigh Valley Trust Company, however it continued to manage its mortgage accounts, and was allowed to reopen on March 14th. After reopening, Liberty Trust only managed mortgages for several years. In January 1938 a reorganzation of the bank was made, and afterwards it was again fully certified as a member of the Federal Reserve System under a new name, Liberty Bank and Trust Company.

The bank operated successfully for a number of decades in Allentown. On December 30, 1960 Liberty Bank merged with the Union Bank and Trust Company of Bethlehem, and the Allentown bank at 830 Hamilton became knows as it's "Liberty Office". In 1969, it simply became Union Bank and Trust Company. In 1972, Union Bank and Trust was purchaced by the Bethlehem-based Lehigh Valley Bank. Union Bank and Trust then removed the clock and cupola from it's downtown Hamilton Mall building, along with the long-silenced bell in March, 1972 in a building remodeling project. On 16 July 1972 the refurbished building reopened as simply Union Bank. In 1973 two branches in Allentown were opened, one in the West End at 3020 Tilghman in January and another at 1130 Union Boulevard on the East Side in July. In May 1986 the Union Bank name was removed and the bank was renamed as Lehigh Valley Bank. Lehigh Valley Bank was then purchaced by Philadelphia-based Core States Financial in November 1994.

In April 1996, Core States Bank closed its Allentown locations, and all of its three locations were vacated. After it was closed as a bank, the 830 Hamilton Mall building was taken over by the Alliance For Building Communities, a non-profit organization which operated from it until 2011 when it was aquired by the Butz Corporation as part of its expansion of its headquarters. It was torn down in 2012 and the land became part of the Alvin H Butz office building in 2013.