When J.D. Gunn opened the first branch of the National Trust Co. in Saskatoon, its quarters were located in a shack. Two years later, business growth justified the construction of this enduring structure. With space of 75 feet by 140 feet, the National Trust Building was then considered a “spacious and handsome block” and “one of the most substantial bank buildings in the city.” Built ca. 1908, the building was situated on the northwest corner of one of the city’s principal thoroughfares: 2nd Avenue, Saskatoon’s equivalent of New York’s Wall Street or Toronto’s Bay Street. The building is now usually called the Folk Building, after Lex Folk, who founded Folk’s Finer Furs.
