Viola Building and Loan Association stock certificate 1929 (Illinois)

Viola IL banking piece!  Fantastic vignette of a two story residential home flanked by two smaller vignettes.  Issued and perf cancelled 1930 to the left. Light folds and wrinkling. Dated 1929. Approximately 11 x 8.5 inches.

The financial institution allowed their members to borrow money build a home and pay it back in amounts not greater than the rent they would ordinarily pay. This is like a credit union of today. Believed to be formed in 1910, the Great Depression forced this association into receivership in 1936 with assets taken over by the Farmers State Bank. This later became the Farmers State Bank of Western Illinois

Viola is a village in Mercer County, Illinois, United States. The population was 869 at the 2020 census. Viola is in eastern Mercer County at the junction of U.S. Route 67 and Illinois Route 17. US 67 passes through the village on 13th Street, leading north 22 miles to Rock Island and south the same distance to Monmouth.

Viola, Illinois, was laid out as a railroad center a few miles south of Rock Island in 1856 and grew into a town with several public buildings, including churches and a hotel. Viola Township in Lee County, originally named Stockton, was formed in 1861 (originally part of Brooklyn Township) and renamed the same year. Viola grew with the construction of public buildings like the Masonic Hall (1870), various churches, the Violetta Hotel (1904), and the Viola Opera House (1908).

The Masonic Hall was the work of John Gilbert, the town's master carpenter. John Gilbert began to build Viola. In 1878 he built the Presbyterian church. He followed that with the United Presbyterian Church in 1890, the Catholic Church in 1891, and a Methodist church in 1903. His other public buildings included the Violetta Hotel in 1904 and the grand Viola Opera House in 1908. When the opera house burned in 1913, John Gilbert rebuilt it. John also built the Viola Post Office in 1893.

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