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Bernanke's foreclosure-crisis tie

by Frank James

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke may be taking the housing foreclosure crisis more personally than a lot of other Washington policymakers since his childhood home in Dillon, S.C. was recently in foreclosure.

The Wall Street Journal has the story. An excerpt:

DILLON, S.C. -- Travis Jackson walks through his modest ranch house, admiring the kitchen's built-in spice rack and the red-oak floors. He draws back the curtains, and sunlight illuminates the pride on his face.

The young banker just bought Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke's childhood home at a foreclosure sale.

"This is where it all happened," marvels Mr. Jackson, a 27-year-old loan officer at First Citizens Bancorp, which is down the street from the old Bernanke place. "Kind of a surreal feeling, isn't it?"

Mr. Bernanke's family sold the property more than a decade ago. It ended up on the block late last year after its former owners fell behind on their mortgage payments.

Not quite sure what Jackson means when he says "it all happened" in that house. I mean, we're talking Bernanke here. Thinking of Bernanke working on quadratic equations at the kitchen table doesn't quite have the same impact for me as imagining during a visit to Monticello what Thomas Jefferson was up to.

Still, there is something unquestionably perverse about the house where Bernanke grew up being foreclosed on.

(Bernanke photo by Joshua Roberts/Bloomberg News)

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