Adamowski v. Curtis-Wright Flying Service, Inc.

1 Mass. App. Div. 569
CourtMassachusetts District Court, Appellate Division
DecidedDecember 14, 1936
StatusPublished

This text of 1 Mass. App. Div. 569 (Adamowski v. Curtis-Wright Flying Service, Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Massachusetts District Court, Appellate Division primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Adamowski v. Curtis-Wright Flying Service, Inc., 1 Mass. App. Div. 569 (Mass. Ct. App. 1936).

Opinion

Estes, J.

This is an action of contract to recover $1600 paid to the defendant on the ground that the plaintiff was a minor when the contract was entered into. The trial judge, finding in behalf of the plaintiff filed the following:

The court found the following facts:

“This is an action of contract to recover the sum of sixteen hundred (1600) dollars and interest paid to the defendant under contracts made during the infancy of the plaintiff. The writ is dated July 11, 1931, returnable the second Saturday in August 1931, with an ad damnum of three thousand (3000) dollars.
I find the .facts to be substantially as follows:
The plaintiff, a minor, entered into a contract with the defendant, the Curtis-Wright Flying Service, Inc. for instruction as a private pilot, on September 25, 1929. The cost of the course was three hundred (300) dollars, and the same was completed and paid for. On February 27, 1930, the plaintiff entered into a contract with the defendant for a course of instmetion as a limited [570]*570commercial pilot, the cost of the course being thirteen hundred (1300) dollars. The course was completed and paid for. On May 6, 3930, the plaintiff entered into a contract with the defendant for a. course of instruction as a transport pilot, the cost of the course being thirty-two hundred (3200) dollars. This course was not completed, and no amount was paid on account of the cost of the same. At the time these contracts were signed, the plaintiff was a minor. The plaintiff voluntarily withdrew from the transport pilot’s course in May, 1930, and attained his majority on July 20, 1930. On February 28,1931 after receiving a notice that he owed a balance of forty-eight dollars and fifty five cents (48.55) on account of the instruction received under the third contract, he visited the office of the attorney for the defendant at New Bedford, Mass., and stated he did not owe any money to the defendant. He did not disaffirm his contracts until July 11, 1931, when he brought the present action. The plaintiff is the son of a textile weaver employed at New Bedford, Mass. He went to work at the age of sixteen, as a plumber’s helper. Later, he worked in an auto garage, earning on an average of twenty (20) dollars per week, and later did some laboring work at twenty-two (22) dollars per week. He left New York in the early part of 1929, and went to work for Carpen Brothers as an upholsterer, earning on an average of twenty-four (24) dollars per week. He left this job to take the course of flying instruction from the defendant. At this time, las folks had accumulated two thousand (2000) dollars, and he, himself, had accumulated four hundred (400) dollars. He took the course ‘because he wanted to learn a new trade and earn a good living. ’ The plaintiff failed to qualify as a private pilot, or as a limited commercial pilot, although he had taken examinations for same. He has been unable to obtain work in any commercial flying service as a result of having taken this course.
It is agreed by counsel for the parties hereto that the law of the State of New York is applicable in this ease.
I find that the plaintiff was a minor at the time the contracts were made; that he was a minor at the time of the execution of the first and second contracts and at [571]*571the time that he left the school in May 1930; during his instruction under the third contract. I find that he disaffirmed his contracts and that the disaffirmance was within a reasonable time after attaining his majority. I further find that the courses of instruction were not necessaries for the plaintiff.
I rule that under the law of the State of New York, the plaintiff, having received from the defendant only an intangible right, in the nature of flying school instruction, is not chargeable for the benefit, if any, received from such instruction. International Text Book Co. v. Connelly, 286 N. Y. 188; Green v. Green, 69 N. Y. 553. Rice v. Butler, 160 N. Y. 578; Wyatt v. Lortscher, 216 N. Y. Supp. 571; McCarthy v. Bowling Green Storage Co., 169 N. Y. Supp. 463.
Judgment for the plaintiff in the sum of twenty-one hundred sixty-three dollars ($2163).”

The case is to be decided according to the law of New York. The three contentions made before us are:

(I) Did the course of instruction constitute necessaries for the plaintiff?

(II) Has the plaintiff a right to rescind this contract as an executed contract?

(III) If the plaintiff has a right to rescind did he do so within a reasonable time after reaching his majority.

(1) As to the contract being one of necessaries. It was said in International Text Book Co. v. Connelly, 206 N. Y. 188,195 “what are necessaries depends on circumstances to some extent and frequently involves a question of fact. The word necessaries as used in the law is a relative term, except when applied to such things as are obviously requisite for the maintenance of existence and depends on the social position and situation in life of the infant as well as upon his own fortune and that of his parents. What would be necessary in a legal sense for an infant with ample means of his own might not be so for one with no means at all. A proper education is necessary but what is a proper educa[572]*572tian depends on circumstances. A common school education is doubtless necessary in this country, because it is essential to the transaction of business and the adequate discharge of civil and political duties. A classical or professional education, however, has been held not to come within the term (cases cited). Still circumstances not found in the cases cited may exist where even such an education might properly be found a necessary as a matter of fact. ’ ’

There it was held that a course of instruction in complete steam engineering with five years in which to finish it, was held not a necessary because of lack of evidence as to facts bearing on the question of its necessity. As to a course of electrical instruction and relying upon International Text Book Co. v. Connelly, supra, see Crandall v. Coyne Electrical School, 256 Ill. Ap. 322.

The defendant relies upon Curtis v. Roosevelt Aviation School Inc., 1934 U. S. Aviation Reports, 135. This was a municipal court ease before a single justice, in which it was declared that a contract for instructions in an aviation school to prepare an infant student as a mechanic is a contract for necessaries. The sole sentence on this point in the opinion reads, “it is my view that the course of study sought was to secure mechanical knowledge to equip plaintiff for a job in that line and should be classified as a necessary.” There are no citations supplementing that statement and evidently the words of the justice are to be construed as a finding of fact rather than as a ruling of law. The course of instruction in the case at bar cannot be said, as a matter of law to be a necessary.

(2) As to the plaintiff’s right to rescind an executed contract. In the nature of things, the contract being instruction given by the defendant to the plaintiff there can be no return of the consideration received by the plaintiff.

In Wyatt v. Lortscher, 217 App. Div. (N. Y.) 224 it is said [573]

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Related

International Text Book Co. v. . Connelly
99 N.E. 722 (New York Court of Appeals, 1912)
Rice v. . Butler
55 N.E. 275 (New York Court of Appeals, 1899)
Nau v. Vulcan Rail & Construction Co.
36 N.E.2d 106 (New York Court of Appeals, 1941)
Green v. . Green
69 N.Y. 553 (New York Court of Appeals, 1877)
Parsons v. . Teller
80 N.E. 930 (New York Court of Appeals, 1907)
Robinson v. . Chittenden
69 N.Y. 525 (New York Court of Appeals, 1877)
McCarthy v. Bowling Green Storage & Van Co.
182 A.D. 18 (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York, 1918)
Wyatt v. Lortscher
217 A.D. 224 (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York, 1926)
Darlington v. Hamilton Bank
63 Misc. 289 (New York Supreme Court, 1909)
Aldrich v. Funk
1 N.Y.S. 541 (New York Supreme Court, 1888)
Welch v. King
181 N.E. 846 (Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, 1932)

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1 Mass. App. Div. 569, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/adamowski-v-curtis-wright-flying-service-inc-massdistctapp-1936.