Apache State Bank
a.k.a. American National Bank;The Inman Building
Evans and Coblake, Apache, OK"I remember as a child going to town in a wagon," recalls an elderly California woman in a letter to the Apache Historical Society, "and the first thing I saw was that bank building. I thought then it Was so beautiful and still do." Impressions on youth -- and especially those that help shape the thinking and emotional loyalties of youth grown-old -- provide a true, if not always readily measurable clue to historical significance. The letter writer is but one of many whose feelings toward the one-time Apache State Bank building have brought about a modest, minor miracle in the small southwestern Oklahoma town of Apache and established something of an ad hoc "significance" for an aging two-story sandstone structure seemingly slated for demolition.
Historically, the Apache bank building has lived out its 70-year existence according to a script followed by thousands of similar small town structures all across the country, but perhaps particularly on the Great Plains because of the time in history this area developed. If the town of Apache appeared on the scene somewhat later than most (1901) and remained smaller (present population 1455), its evolution has not been untypical. This three-county area was opened to white settlement August 6, 1901. Apache sprang up almost overnight as a tent city with the routine complement of lumber yards, general merchandise emporiums and saloons - plus a newspaper, and a bank. Three months later it acquired its second financial institution, the Apache State Bank ... and demonstrated the corporate character trait that was to mark the se small towns indelibly for the next half century. Choosing a yellowish-brown sandstone quarried from the hills southwest of the town, the new bank's directors authorized construction of a structure that remains today the town's most prepossessing. Banks were the most important businesses in these newly established towns. As such, they were expected as a matter of course to occupy the town's most imposing buildings. Accordingly, they staked out a choice corner lot in the heart of the business section, proceeded to erect the most impressive structure imagination and/or financial resources allowed. Invariably it was two stories or more in height and embraced most if not all of these conditions: solidly classic lines, durable materials (brick or rook), ornamented corner doorway into the bank itself with tower (and/or cupola) to highlight it, miscellaneous lesser business enterprises at either or both ends of the building's street-fronting extremities, offices for doctors, dentists and lawyers on the upper floor or floors.
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 1972.
The National Register of Historic Places is the official list of the Nation’s historic places worthy of preservation. Authorized by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places is part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate, and protect America’s historic and archeological resources.