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Extract from Bank Of NSW History, Uralla Branch.(4th December 1971)
Wales 100 Years In Uralla.
On Saturday the bank of NSW will have given 100 years of unbroken service to the town and district of Uralla.
David Gwyn Davies from the banks head office in Sydney opened a agency attached to the Armidale branch in the lease premises the exact location of which is not know it was Urallas first bank.
In 1874, the agency was converted to a full branch in those days Uralla was a mere township and gazzetted as a village in 1855. It came into assistance as result of discovery of gold at rocky river and other places in 1852. As with most such rush's the first frenzied activity soon weakened than in flared up again in 1856 with a even greater activity but this second rush also short lived and did not lead to any lasting development, although at its height some 5000 people were living on the rocky river Field.
The pastoral history of the district of course goes back to many years before the rocky river rush's, as early as 1833, Edward Gostwyck Cory had squatted at Salisbury waters and occupied Gostwyck, terrible vale and Salisbury plains and the following year Henery Dumaresq had taken up saumarez.
on December the first 1871 the board of the bank of NSW had excepted a recommendation by its inspector T. O'Sullivan Green that he open up an agency at Uralla, he acted quickly and opened the office. The following year the bank leased premises from John McCrossin.
Over the years various alterations and additions were made. In 1910 a new banking chamber was added, as in 1917 electrical light was installed. In 1946 the bank sold the property to Uralla pictures society pty in the mean time it had erected the present premises in 1940 on an allotment it had bought from William John Wales, to be a picture theater.
The wales is fortunate in having an excellent state of preservation of the first books of Uralla agency and branch and to browse through them is gain a vivid picture of the past reflected in the names of the men and women in the early days who where bank customers. They were squatters, store keepers, hotel keepers, blacksmiths, mine laborers and at least one who described himself simply as a bush-man. There were several Chinese some of whom signed there name in symbols and there were some customers who couldn't even sign there names but made there mark.
So intimately was the wales identified with the life of the town that in essence the branches history is the history of Uralla itself during the last 100 years. The branch shared in the good times as well as the bad but like the district it steadily progressed.

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