Mysteries of History-1880

A short lesson in history.

Mysteries of History

 “Master Card or Visa”

 

The greenback is becoming a memory to society with the continuing use of a little plastic invention called the credit card. Today, with a single stroke of a key on your home computer your money can be transferred thousands of miles away, while you sit at home in your pajama’s. The use of this style of payment is not a new concept, not even a new idea within the past sixty-years. If the world did not start to use credit in the 1950’s, when was it introduced?

The first use of credit cards began to appear around Europe in the 1880’s, and then spread to the United States during the 1920’s. These early charge cards allowed the user to delay payment for up to 30 days, which upon payment had to be paid in full. These, so-called cards were issued by individual merchants " retail stores, oil companies, hotels and so on " to their valued customers.

In 1950, the first credit card, as we know it today, was created to be used by a number of locations. Frank McNamara, head of Hamilton Credit Corporation, was having dinner in New York with his attorney and a friend. When the time came to pay the bill, Frank was embarrassed when he discovered that he did not bring enough cash. The outcome of that unfortunate evening was the three friends formed the Diner’s Club, that was accepted at 27 restaurants.

These early cards were made of paper and the restaurant had to pay 7% per transaction, while the consumer paid a three-dollar annual fee. McNamara considered the use of credit cards a passing fad, but it turned out to be a very lucrative business. In 1958, American Express and Bank Americard (which later became Visa) were established and the era of “swiping the plastic” had been born

Author's Note

Please be honest.