John Smith's bank was the Kirtland Safety Society. It started January 1837 and collapsed in November of that year. It was a "Wildcat Bank", and didn't last because these banks had no real financial security and were often barter using unsecured paper money. This was during the Free Banking Era from 1837 to 1862.
TLDR, The history of US monetary policy had a lot of politics, favoritism, corruption of all kinds. After the Civil War the National Bank Acts of 1863 and 1864 finally created national banks.
