A revolutionary change for the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland is depicted in this photo from March 1946 when 16 IBM machines were installed in the Check Collections Department.

“On these machines, experienced operators are listing, sorting and endorsing an average of 1,000 checks per hour per operator,” stated Federal Reserve Notes, the Cleveland Fed's monthly employee newsletter.

The innovative check clearing machines combined three operations into one. Previously, operators used 89-key adding machines to sort and endorse checks in separate operations.

Technology has changed dramatically since 1946: Currently, Cleveland processes nearly 123,000 checks per hour.

—Rosie Cataldo