Billy Barnard was a talented guitarist who had just stepped off years of touring around the United States and landed in Duluth. He looked, as you can see by the photo at top that he shared with us, not exactly like the sort of guy one would loan to if one were a young banker back in the late sixties. But that's what Larry Johnson, now president of North Shore Bank of Commerce did, did. You can see his picture there also to get an idea of what that first meeting might have looked like! That's the difference between a local bank like North Shore and one that drops branches around your city, but sends your money and makes decisions about you far, far away.