Fulton v. Fulton

528 S.W.2d 146, 1975 Mo. App. LEXIS 1755
CourtMissouri Court of Appeals
DecidedSeptember 22, 1975
Docket9693
StatusPublished
Cited by37 cases

This text of 528 S.W.2d 146 (Fulton v. Fulton) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Missouri Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Fulton v. Fulton, 528 S.W.2d 146, 1975 Mo. App. LEXIS 1755 (Mo. Ct. App. 1975).

Opinion

TITUS, Judge.

Grace Brady Fulton (Grace) sued J. C. Fulton (J. C.) for divorce in the Circuit Court of Oregon County, Missouri, on March 9,1973. In the amended Count II of the petition Grace asked the court to award her a 92-acre Oregon County farm, certain livestock, and all the household goods, furnishings and farming equipment located on the farm “as the property settlement between plaintiff and defendant.” The petition alleged the farm, household goods, furnishings and farming equipment had been acquired by Grace as her separate property before the marriage and that she had purchased the livestock with her own money without contribution from J. C. The amended counterclaim filed on behalf of J. C. asked for (1) a divorce, (2) alimony in gross, (3) a decree declaring Grace in contempt for violating an injunctive order, (4) a decree fixing J. C.’s rights to the farm either via a resulting trust, joint adventure or equitable lien, (5) an accounting of J. C.’s interest in the sale of livestock and other personal property by Grace, and (6) partition of the real estate. The court nisi entered judgment for J. C. on Grace’s petition and for Grace on J. C.’s counterclaim. J. C. alone perfected his appeal, contending the trial court erred in not finding for him on all items of his asseverations save his claim for alimony and partition. However, since the appeal, Grace, without apparent objection from J. C., has secured a divorce or dissolution of the marriage elsewhere, so that phase of the matter is now moot. 1

Ages of the parties are unknown, but neither was unseasoned nor a neophyte at nuptials. Both resided in California when our concern commences. Grace became a widow in 1965 upon the demise of Barney Brady; J. C. was then married to one Laura. Within “several weeks” after Grace assumed widowhood, or more precisely in January 1966, J. C. began to pay her court. Intolerant of the association Laura sued J. C. for divorce and obtained a final decree therefor on July 21, 1967. J. C. and Grace married eight months later in March 1968 and moved onto the Oregon County, Missouri, farm in July 1968.

In July 1966 while J. C. was still wedded to but separated from Laura, he and Grace *150 journeyed from California to Missouri and Arkansas on vacation. The trip’s purpose was to visit kin and neither sojourner contemplated the purchase of real estate in the vacation area or elsewhere. While picnicking with Grace’s sister and brother-in-law and through sheer happenstance, the quartette espied a “For Sale” sign in the yard of the Oregon County farm in question and inquired of the owners in residence. The total price was $17,000 — $1,000 was needed to hold the deal, another $4,000 was required forthwith before deed delivery, and the balance was to be evidenced by a $12,-000 promissory note payable in yearly $1,000 installments plus interest. From this point forward the evidence is in disaccord.

Grace said that before seeing the farm she and J. C. had no discussions concerning their possible marriage. Contrawise, J. C. testified that a day or two before the farm was purchased, and while the two were ensconced in the romantic confines of a fishing boat, he broached the subject of marriage to Grace (to become effective when his divorce from Laura became final) and she expressed amenability to the proposition. Under Grace’s version, J. C. had no part in purchasing the farm or in the negotiations relative thereto. Additionally Grace contended that J. C. did not contribute to the $1,000 holding payment because “I had the money to pay the down payment on the farm” ($500 of which was borrowed from her father), that there was no understanding the title was to be put in her and J. C.’s joint names when his divorce became final, nor any agreement that J. C. was to have any interest in the farm, either at the time of purchase or thereafter. In support of her assertions, Grace produced five checks of $100 each dated from November 1966 to May 1967 payable to her father. They were drawn on a California bank against the account of Barney H. and Grace L. Brady. Grace said these checks represented restitution of the $500 she had borrowed from her father to make one-half of the $1,000 holding payment. Also, Grace put in evidence a $4,000 check dated July 5, 1966, drawn on the California bank against the same account, which she testified completed the $5,000 down payment on the farm. Grace additionally proffered a $1,000 written receipt from the farm sellers which did not mention J. C., the warranty deed to the farm dated July 2, 1966, naming Grace Brady as the lone grantee, and the paid $17,000 promissory note dated July 18,1966, signed by Grace Brady as the sole maker. Grace ceded, however, that J. C. had given her a total of $3,800 (none of which was for the holding payment) “and I paid it on the farm.” She had kept in an address book a penned record of J. C.’s payments to her in 1966 after they returned from their vacation trip. Under the heading, “J. C. Paid on House and Farm,” Grace had recorded two $250 and one $100 payments in July 1966, and 12 payments of $50 each to November 18, 1966. She acknowledged also that J. C. gave her $1,000 “for the payment on the place in December of ’67”, and that in January 1969 J. C. gave her $1,500 which she put with money drawn from her account in the California bank “for the payoff of the place.” 2 During 1967, according to Grace, J. C. “give [sic] me some [money], but not very much. [H]e told me to use it for whatever I wanted and he ate his meals at my house, two meals a day . . and I used the money for groceries.” Grace had no record or recollection of the amount J. C. gave her in 1967 (save the $1,000 payment in December 1967), and testified that after moving to Missouri in July 1968, J. C. gave her money “from time to time [and] told me to do [with it] whatever I wanted to.” Grace asserted that J. C. did not work after they moved to Missouri and that they lived off her $21 a month retirement, money she got for keeping foster children for a year and a half, and money from the sale of pigs. Grace maintained that no money given her by J. C. went into her account in the Cali *151 fornia bank and that J. C. made no deposits to that account nor to the joint account they had in the Alton (Missouri) Bank, more of which anon. It was agreed that after J. C.’s divorce from Laura became final, he asked Grace to put the farm in their joint names and she refused. Grace did not admit knowledge of the farm’s value on the date of trial (November 8, 1973), but did admit that “over three years ago” she had the place listed for sale at $43,000.

Contrary to Grace’s recastings, J. C. maintained he was a participant in the inspection, negotiations and purchase of the farm. He said that when the terms of the sale were ascertained, “Grace and myself [sic] decided we could get up five hundred dollars between us. And her father [said] he would loan us five hundred dollars to pay the thousand dollars ... to hold the deal. And we would send [the other $4,000] back to him when we got back to California. [S]o the money I had and the money [Grace] had and the [borrowed $500] made the thousand dollar payment.” When asked what was said about the title between J. C. and Grace while they were dealing to buy the farm, J. C. related: “I was in the process of getting a divorce in California and we discussed . . . putting the place in [Grace’s] name so this ex-wife of mine . . . couldn’t cause us any trouble.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Slaton v. Jones
195 S.W.3d 392 (Court of Appeals of Arkansas, 2004)
Ward v. Hudgens
22 S.W.3d 260 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 2000)
Correale v. Hall
9 S.W.3d 624 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1999)
Fugitt v. Fugitt
850 S.W.2d 396 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1993)
In Re Marriage of Mayfield
780 S.W.2d 139 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1989)
Western Casualty & Surety Co. v. Kansas City Bank & Trust Co.
743 S.W.2d 578 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1988)
Dothage v. Dothage
727 S.W.2d 925 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1987)
Estate of Huskey v. Monroe
674 S.W.2d 205 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1984)
Dallas v. Dallas
670 S.W.2d 535 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1984)
Haas v. Haas
669 S.W.2d 592 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1984)
State Ex Rel. State Highway Commission of Missouri v. Morganstein
649 S.W.2d 485 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1983)
Hallmark v. Stillings
648 S.W.2d 230 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1983)
First National Bank v. South Side National Bank
644 S.W.2d 377 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1982)
Stillings v. Citizens Bank of Ava
637 S.W.2d 401 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1982)
Barnes v. Bank of Bourbon
619 S.W.2d 906 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1981)
Miner v. Anderson (In Re Anderson)
12 B.R. 483 (W.D. Missouri, 1981)
Jones v. Anderson
618 S.W.2d 252 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1981)
Fenton v. Walter
612 S.W.2d 17 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1981)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
528 S.W.2d 146, 1975 Mo. App. LEXIS 1755, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/fulton-v-fulton-moctapp-1975.