A Little Credit Card History
A little credit card history.
The Chinese are credited with coming up with numerous inventions including gunpowder, umbrellas, chopsticks, paper and paper money. Lamentable, (from the Chinese point of view), the honors of coming up with plastic money went with early American capitalists.
Today it’s referred as the old plastic but all credit card buffs know that the first credit cards were not made of plastic but cellulose and metal plates.
Encyclopedia Britannica documents that, the use of credit cards originated in the United States during the 1920s, when individual firms, such as oil companies and hotel chains, began issuing them to customers.
Also, in the 1920’s, stylish stores in the United States issued them to their favorite customers. At that time they were highly localized in acceptance. So if you lived in Los Angeles you couldn’t use your credit card in New York.
But credit cards gained nationwide usage after Henry Ford gave the world mass produced automobiles. The ability to travel across America had the unintended consequence of popularizing the credit card usage.
John Biggins, of the Flatbush National Bank of Brooklyn, New York, is credited with the invention of the first bank issued credit card in 1946
The 1950’s saw the founding of the Diners Club, which is now one of the biggest international credit card companies. Its founder, Mr. Frank McNamara was probably surprised by the way his start up turned out to be.
Diners Club cards were first intended to enable Diners Club members to have their meals without paying for them, and
Diners Club would foot the bill. The customers then would repay Diners Club.
In 1951, Bank of America, encouraged by Diners success, started a card that is now called VISA. And other California banks started their card which later became MasterCard. The American Express made its debut in 1958.
At that time, the banks realized that the card business was a mass market business They later began mailing to anyone with an address (some of them dead) offering the new found craze.
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