is support available.  Historically there were many more bank failures in the era before the Federal Reserve, and little evidence to suggest that they were any less reckless.  In the period 1837-1862 the average life span of a bank was 5 years.
Immediately prior to the Federal Reserve System, much of these two roles were taken up by private banks.  A system of "National Banks" were in place, which held accounts for smaller regional banks, in much the same way the Federal Reserve Banks would later do.  Similarly institutions such as the New York Safety Fund would provide deposit insurance, while others acted as pseudo lenders of last resort.
One irritating consequence of having no central bank, is that the value of currency depends upon the(part of the money supply).  He pays \$1000 of taxes to the government.
The government pays Alice \$1000 to pay of the debt, which goes into her account (part of the money supply)
Alice spends this \$1000 at Dave's shop and it goes into his account.
Dave pays \$500 of taxes from his current account.
The government pays Bob \$500 which goes into his current account.
In this example, \$1000 of money pays of \$1500 of debt, and ends up with \$500 sat in Dave's account and \$500 sat in Bob's account, ready to carry on the cycle.
The only impediment to paying off the debt is raising sufficient money to have a budget surplus with which to pay back the debt.

