From selling wax in Santiago to bankers and building the first financial headquarters building in Galicia

In the 1830s, Manuel Pérez Sáenz, from Rioja, came to Santiago and started working in a candle shop in Francisco Rodriguez Arijon, who will eventually become his nephew. A successful business, therefore, considering the need for the product for both domestic and religious use, but which in time expanded, including transactions with America with the importation of coir or mille. Logo, began to borrow letters for tickets for those people who crossed the Atlantic and later served as a channel for sending letter shipments. That is how he defined the financial entity Compostela, which will have its main visible head in Olimpio Pérez, Manuel’s family.

History that was renamed in 1987 Galician bank é unha das protagonistas da exposition do Archive of Galicia From traders to bankers. As orixes da banca in Galicia, which will be shown on October 15 ninety pieces between books or loans, bonds, letters and announcements and reports with the aim of deepening the phenomenon of banking activity at a time of profound political transformation.

The first headquarters of the bank

Among the documents I am collecting, which are related to that bank, two descendants of Pérez Sáenz found a plan for the construction of the current Praza de Cervantes in Santiago the first building erected expressly for the bank’s headquarters in Galicia in 1886 -or the current Abanca Center-. The undeveloped space was previously occupied by six houses that already owned it, among which was a 15th-century palace belonging to the Viscounts of Torres Novaes. This was not the only fito carried out by the banking entity. why thanks to a loan from Olimpia Pérez financed by the Conxo Psychiatric Hospital, Driven from or Cabido Compostelán.

To trace the origins of the Galician Bank or the Galician Archives, look for documentation that it is held by Royal Economic Society of Friends of the Land of Santiago and or Banco Sáenz-Olimpio Pérezboth from Santiago, ea Bengoechea Bank and Trade House, from Ribade. In addition, two fits associated with a banking entity associated with Olimpia Pérez, the show highlights the intense activity of the Real Sociedad Económica de Amigos do País, which stands out as sponsored by creation of the Caixa de Aforros e Monte da Piedade in Santiago in 1878..

In the case of the Casa de Comercio Bengoechea de Ribadeo, founded by Francisco Antonio de Bengochea in Biscay in the first third of the 19th century and dedicated to commercial, shipping and banking activities, the exhibition focused on his participation in the production of the Vilaoudriz Mine, the most important extractive activity iron in Galicia.

The exhibition was presented in front of the general director for culture, Anx Lorenzo, emphasizing how it serves to make the two archives visible or working. Also, I would like to thank the two borrowers for their trust in the documentation.