Great Western Bank (previously known as Great Western Savings & Loan) was a large retail bank that operated primarily in the Western United States. Great Western's headquarters were in Chatsworth, California. At one time, Great Western was one of the largest savings and loan in the United States, second only to Home Savings of America. The bank was acquired by Washington Mutual in 1997 for $6.8 billion. Great Western Bank was held by Great Western Financial Corporation ("GWFC"), a corporation organized under the laws of the state of Delaware that was traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the stock symbol "GWF". History Early years Great Western was founded in 1919 in California as a savings and loan association. Great Western can trace its lineage to the incorporation in 1925 of a savings and loan association called "Great Western Building and Loan Association" that was located in downtown Los Angeles and was founded by a group of immigrant investors from Czechoslovakia. Seventeen years later, the company changed its name to "Great Western Savings and Loan Association" in 1942. By January 1948 the company had its main office in downtown on Flower street and a branch office on Crenshaw. The company opened a new building in 1956 at Crenshaw and Vernon to replace its previous branch on Crenshaw and to serve as its new headquarters. In 1955, Great Western Corp. was formed as a publicly owned holding company for Great Western Savings and Loan Association and its subsidiaries through the issuance of stock and later changed its name to Great Western Financial Corp. the following year. The stock began listing on the American Stock Exchange in 1957. Within five years, Great Western Financial acquired Bakersfield Savings (1956), Santa Ana Savings (1956), West Coast Savings of Sacramento (1957), Guaranty Savings of San Jose (1958), Central Savings of San Luis Obispo (1959), and First Savings of Oakland (1959). A change in the state law in 1965 allowed Great Western Financial to consolidate some of its separate saving and loan units. West Coast Savings and Guaranty Savings was merged into First Savings and Santa Ana Savings into Great Western Savings, leaving four separate S&L units and making its Great Western Savings unit the fourth largest S&L in the nation. The company later bought Santa Rosa Savings (1968) and Safety Savings of south central Los Angeles (1969), Belmont Savings of Long Beach (1969), Citizens