Terrell was founded in 1873. C. M. Bivens, John H. Corley, and F. A. Waters opened a private bank there in 1875, and in 1878 Asa Holt replaced Waters as one of the owners. The business later became the Bivens and Corley Bank and moved to this site. A second financial institution, the Childress Brothers' Bank, was founded in 1876. Col. Jim Harris, who bought an interest in 1882, acquired the Childress bank in 1885 and the Bivens and Corley Bank in 1887, merging them as the Harris Bank. That same year Terrell also gained a federally chartered bank, the First National, whose founders included Oscar B. Colquitt, later governor of Texas. After Col. Harris died in 1895, A. J. Childress, John H. Corley, and seven other citizens bought the Harris estate and formed Harris National Bank. Its directors included railroad magnate Edward H. R. Green, son of financier Hetty Green. In 1903 Harris National was renamed American National Bank. When the depression of the 1930s strained Terrell's resources, the town's two national banks were merged, and by 1976 American National Bank was the oldest and largest financial institution in Kaufman County.