For some time previous to the year 1837 there was a fever raging over the United States. It was not a sickness that hurt the body, but the fever to buy for little and sell for much, and thus grow suddenly rich. It was the fever of speculation. Railroad engines had just been invented and were so successful that almost everybody who had money or could borrow it wished to buy railroad stock and make his fortune at once. People began moving out westward to the fertile lands of the Mississippi valley, and those who could lay their hands on money bought large tracts of land, hoping by the rise of prices to make immense profits. At this time, too, President Andrew Jackson, in order to destroy the national bank, took away the public money and placed it in private banks. This made it easier to borrow and speculation was consequently increased. In 1836 the Prophet Joseph and other leading men of the Church, desiring to aid the business of the Saints in a proper way, established a kind of bank called the Kirtland Safety Society. In the beginning of 1837 actual business was started up and for a time all went well. But after a while the spirit of the land seized many of the brethren and they began to speculate wildly. Joseph saw that this would lead to evil and ruin, and he gave them serious warning. At length, unwilling to support anything that was not carried on in righteousness, he broke off all connection with the society. The natural result of the speculation in this country came in 1837. It was a financial crash such as the people of the United States have never known at any other time. Land and railroad stock and other kinds of property would rise no higher in price and began to come down. Men grew frightened and tried to sell, but others were frightened and would not buy, so those who held the stocks were ruined, as most speculators are sooner or later. Many banks failed because they had used the money that people had put in and could not pay it back. The Kirtland Safety Society also failed. Warren Parrish had stolen twenty thousand dollars or more from it, and other apostates and enemies of the Church fought against it. Many of the brethren, however, spent all they had to pay its debts. This speculation and the failure and ruin that followed it, caused many men to apostatize from the Church and become bitter enemies to Joseph. He had warned them, but the lust for riches had filled their souls, driving out the Spirit of God, and they rejected his counsel. Yet the Prophet was blamed for the failure of the bank, when this was caused by their own mistakes and dishonesty.