While T.B. Walker and his Red River Lumber Company had a profound impact on Lassen County, Leon Bly and his Eagle Lake irrigation plan ranks right up there with Walker.
The Lassen Industrial Bank was established in the spring of 1912. It met with such success that in 1914 they opened a branch at Bieber and in 1917 another branch at Fall River Mills.
With tremendous growth caused by the lumber industry, the bank built a $100,000 two-story building at the corner of Main and Gay Streets. But the good times did not last long. The bank had nearly over extended itself with loans to the farmers of Bly’s irrigation project, that had failed shortly after the tunnel was completed in 1923. This caused, the bank to start foreclosures on those farmers, and many of those properties were worthless without water. By the summer of 1928, the rumor on the streets of Susanville was in full blast, that either the bank was going to be sold, and worse yet go into bankruptcy. In early August 1928, A.P. Giannini of the Bank of America came to the aid with a $100,000 cash bail out, in which on December 1, 1928, officially took over the Lassen Industrial Bank.