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Expanded Information
What is a Credit Union?
Credit unions are unique depository institutions created not for profit, but to serve their members as credit cooperatives. For more than 100 years, credit unions have provided financial services to their members in the United States.
The earliest financial cooperatives date back to the beginning of 19th century in England. A few decades later, credit unions took root in Germany. Organized by Herman Schulze-Delitzsch and Friedrich Raiffeisen, these early credit unions became the model for today’s credit unions in the United States. Distinguishing features of these German credit unions included:
Democratic governance; Each member has one vote, regardless of the size of the member’s deposits; Member-elected board of directors; and Volunteer based.
In 1934, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed the Federal Credit Union Act into law, creating a national system to charter and to supervise federal
credit unions. The credit union movement grew steadily in the 1940s and 1950s. By 1960, credit union membership amounted to more than 6 million individuals belonging to more than 10,000 federal
credit unions.
In 1970, the National Credit Union Administration (NCUA) became an independent federal agency. Congress also
created the National Credit Union Share Insurance Fund (NCUSIF) to protect deposits at credit unions.
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Source: http://www.ncua.gov/about/history/Pages/CUHistory.aspx


































































































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