The Texas Commerce Bank (officially Texas Commerce Bank N.A., with its parent bank holding company known as Texas Commerce Bancshares, Inc.) was a Texas-based bank acquired by Chemical Banking Corporation of New York in May 1987. The acquisition of Texas Commerce Bank represented the largest interstate banking merger in history at the time with a purchase price of $1.2 billion. The bank had its headquarters in what is now the JPMorgan Chase Building (formerly Gulf Building) in Downtown

Downtown Houston

Downtown Houston is the largest business district of Houston, Texas, United States. Downtown Houston, the city's central business district, contains the headquarters of many prominent companies. There is an extensive network of pedestrian tunnels and skywalks connecting the buildings of the district...

 Houston, Texas

Texas

Texas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...

.

Prior to the merger, interstate banking was illegal in Texas and many other states, which effectively prevented such cross-border mergers. Texas and New York had changed their laws to allow a merger of an in-state bank and an out-of-state bank. Without those changes to the law, the merger between Chemical Bank and Texas Commerce Bank, and later Chase Manhattan Bank would not have been possible.

Through a series of mergers and acquisitions Chemical Bank bought Chase Manhattan Bank

Chase Manhattan Bank

JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., doing business as Chase, is a national bank that constitutes the consumer and commercial banking subsidiary of financial services firm JPMorgan Chase. The bank was known as Chase Manhattan Bank until it merged with J.P. Morgan & Co. in 2000...

 and then JP Morgan finally changed Texas Commerce to JPMorgan Chase & Co.

JPMorgan Chase & Co.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. is an American multinational banking corporation of securities, investments and retail. It is the largest bank in the United States by assets and market capitalization.It is a major provider of financial services, with assets of $2 trillion and according to Forbes magazine is...

History

The Texas Commerce Bank traces its roots to 1866. Texas Commerce changed its name to Chase Bank of Texas in 1998 and merged into The Chase Manhattan Bank in 2000.

In 1977, Lady Bird

Lady Bird Johnson

Claudia Alta "Lady Bird" Taylor Johnson was First Lady of the United States from 1963 to 1969 during the presidency of her husband Lyndon B. Johnson. Throughout her life, she was an advocate for beautification of the nation's cities and highways and conservation of natural resources and made that...

 (Claudia Taylor) Johnson (wife of President Lyndon Baines Johnson) became a director of Texas Commerce Bank and Texas Commerce Bancshares in Houston. Other directors were former President Gerald R. Ford, Jr., former U.S. Representative Barbara Jordan

Barbara Jordan

Barbara Charline Jordan was an American politician who was both a product and a leader, of the Civil Rights movement. She was the first African American elected to the Texas Senate after Reconstruction and the first southern black female elected to the United States House of Representatives...

 and the Odessa

Odessa, Texas

Odessa is a city in and the county seat of Ector County, Texas, United States. It is located primarily in Ector County, although a small portion of the city extends into Midland County. Odessa's population was 99,940 at the 2010 census. It is the principal city of the Odessa, Texas Metropolitan...

 oil industrialist Bill Noël

Bill Noël

William Douglas Noël, known as Bill Noël , was an independent oilman, industrialist, banker, rancher, philanthropist, and civic leader in Odessa, Texas.-Background:...

. At one time Ken Lay of Enron

Enron

Enron Corporation was an American energy, commodities, and services company based in Houston, Texas. Before its bankruptcy on December 2, 2001, Enron employed approximately 22,000 staff and was one of the world's leading electricity, natural gas, communications, and pulp and paper companies, with...

 was a director. Past presidents of the bank include Thomas E. Locke of Lubbock

Lubbock, Texas

Lubbock is a city in and the county seat of Lubbock County, Texas, United States. The city is located in the northwestern part of the state, a region known historically as the Llano Estacado, and the home of Texas Tech University and Lubbock Christian University...

.

Jeb Bush

Jeb Bush

John Ellis "Jeb" Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd Governor of Florida from 1999 to 2007. He is a prominent member of the Bush family: the second son of former President George H. W. Bush and former First Lady Barbara Bush; the younger brother of former President George W...

's career started with an entry level position in the international division of the Texas Commerce Bank, a job he received through James A. Baker, III, a long time family friend and chairman of the board. Bush assisted in drafting communications for the company's chairman, Ben Love. In November 1977 he was sent to the Venezuelan capital of Caracas to open a new operation for the bank. Bush spent about two years there, working in international finance. He eventually worked for the bank's executive program.

J.P. Morgan acquired in 1987

References:
Lady Bird Johnson, Director, Texas Commerce Bank - http://content.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=4952