The BROADVIEW FEDERAL SAVINGS BANK began operation in 1919 with $350,000 and grew to be one of the country's top 100 savings and loans, with assets of nearly $2 billion. Broadview opened for business on 19 July 1919 at the corner of Broadview and Pearl roads with August E. Reister as president. It moved to larger quarters at 3344 Broadview Rd. in 1924. Under the direction of Edward J. Rupert, who began a 30-year tenure as president in 1942, Broadview rapidly expanded, occupying a new building at 4221 Pearl Rd. in 1948. With the acquisition of other banking institutions, Broadview's assets grew from $21 million in 1948 to more than $97 million in 1956, making it the largest savings and loan in Ohio. In 1973 Broadview Financial Corp. was organized as a holding company, with Broadview Savings & Loan as its principal subsidiary. Its loan portfolio included real estate projects throughout the U.S. in the early 1980s, when Broadview moved into its spacious new headquarters building at Rockside Rd. and I-77. By 1983 Broadview Financial Corp.'s $1.9 billion in assets placed it 51st among U.S. diversified financial companies ranked by assets.
Broadview, however, had $271 million in troubled commercial loans which brought scrutiny from federal regulators in 1986. In 1987 Broadview Financial Corp. merged into its principal subsidiary Broadview Savings to conserve capital and changed its named to Broadview Savings Bank. After sustaining a net loss of $13.4 million for 1988, the bank's liabilities exceeded its assets by $49 million. It was placed in receivership by the federal authorities and reorganized as the Broadview Federal Savings Bank in 1989. When the federal regulators sold Broadview Savings to Cleveland's First Federal Savings Bank in 1990, it employed 400 people, had $1.6 billion in assets, and 108,500 depositors.
See also CHARTER ONE FINANCIAL.