From the FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.) itself, a great brief history of banking failures in the 1920’s and the Great Depression.  see:  FDIC: Managing the Crisis: The FDIC and RTC Experience.

On average, more than 600 banks failed each year between 1921 and 1929. Those failures led to the end of many state deposit insurance programs. The failed banks were primarily small, rural banks, and people in metropolitan areas were generally unconcerned. Investors and other businessmen thought that the failing institutions were weak and badly managed and that those failures served to strengthen the banking system. A major wave of bank failures during the last few months of 1930 triggered widespread attempts to convert deposits to cash. Confidence in the banking system began to erode, and bank runs became more common. In all, 1,350 banks suspended operations during 1930. Some simply closed their doors due to financial difficulties, while others were placed into receivership.

To begin to understand both the severity of the crisis and the impact it had on everyday Americans, it is necessary to try to come to grips with its magnitude.  In the four years of 1930-1933 alone, nearly 10,000 banks failed or were suspended.  These banks held deposits of over $6.8 billion (equivalent to perhaps $60 billion today’s dollars, but representing a much larger share of depositor’s wealth then).  The depositors in these banks lost nearly 20% of these deposits when the banks failed.  Since there was no FDIC yet, and most state deposit insurance schemes had shut down already, this meant that everyday folks lost their savings, their money.  Imagine that impact.  You’ve worked hard. Saved money to buy a house on one of those shiny new Ford Model A’s or a Chevrolet.  Then one day, your money is just gone.  Disappeared.  It’s a life-changing event for many of those depositors. But then consider that the monies lost by these unfortunate bank customers represented (over the 4 years) approximately 4% of ALL DEPOSITS at ALL BANKS.  Even those fortunate (or lucky) enough to have their money in a sound bank would be scared.  Were they next?  With the Hoover administration and The Federal Reserve seemingly doing nothing to slow the accelerating trend of bank failures, it is no wonder that FDR won a landslide election in 1932 and that a bank holiday and bank reforms were job #1 of his New Deal.

Details in the table after the

There’s also this table of the failures and losses during each year of this period.

1921 – 1933: Commercial Bank Suspensions

Year	Number of Suspensions	Deposits ($)	Losses Borneby Depositors($)	Losses to Depositors as % of Deposits in All Suspended Banks	Losses to Depositors as % of Deposits in All Comm. Banks
1921	506	172,806	59,967	34.70	0.21
1922	366	91,182	38,223	41.92	0.13
1923	646	149,601	62,142	41.54	0.19
1924	775	210,150	79,381	37.77	0.23
1925	617	166,937	60,799	36.42	0.16
1926	975	260,153	83,066	31.93	0.21
1927	669	199,332	60,681	30.44	0.15
1928	498	142,386	43,813	30.77	0.10
1929	659	230,643	76,659	33.24	0.18
1930	1,350	837,096	237,359	28.36	0.57
1931	2,293	1,690,232	390,476	23.10	1.01
1932	1,453	706,187	168,302	23.83	0.57
1933	4,000*	3,596,708	540,396	15.02	2.15
Total	14,807*	$8,453,413	$1,901,264	22.49

*Estimate.
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Source: Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation:
The First Fifty Years.