In re the Estate of Strong

171 Misc. 445, 12 N.Y.S.2d 544, 1939 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 1927
CourtNew York Surrogate's Court
DecidedMay 11, 1939
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 171 Misc. 445 (In re the Estate of Strong) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering New York Surrogate's Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
In re the Estate of Strong, 171 Misc. 445, 12 N.Y.S.2d 544, 1939 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 1927 (N.Y. Super. Ct. 1939).

Opinion

Feely, S.

In and by this their first and intermediate judicial settlement the executors of the above-named testator ask that his last will be construed in several respects, most of which have some relation to the fact that testator and his wife died at the same time in the crash of their airplane on August 27, 1937.

In and by his last will, dated January 4, 1936, testator, in brief, provided for the payment of his debts, etc.; and in the second paragraph bequeathed some jewelry to his wife. In the third paragraph he made four separate gifts of the entire residue of his estate, including what he might receive as heir of any person, and having in mind the provision in the will of his father, H. G. Strong, including also any and all property in respect to which he might have a power of appointment, or which he was authorized to dispose of by will. By subdivision A of this general residuary clause he -did “ give and bequeath ” to two hospitals an amount equivalent to ” one-tenth of his net estate, but not to exceed $250,000 in any event; by subdivision B he gave one-fifth thereof to his wife absolutely; and by subdivision C he gave a quarter to trustees to pay the income thereof to his wife for her life, with the remainder over into the trust for his only child, a daughter, which was created by subdivision D, wherein he gave the remaining nine-twentieths of the estate to a trustee for the benefit of his daughter until she became of full age, when she is to have the unused income, and all the income from then on, until she became twenty-five, or sooner die, and the corpus is to be hers at twenty-five to the extent of one-third, and another third at thirty, and the last third at thirty-five. The residue, in case of her death, is given to her executor or heirs.

The fourth paragraph authorizes the trustee to advance from corpus of the daughter’s trust any extraordinary expenses, not reasonably payable from the income to her, or for the purpose of enabling her to purchase a home, if that be deemed necessary or [448]*448advisable, or to take any other step, the expense of which cannot be paid from income sources available to her, and which shall, in the opinion of the trustees, be for her best interests.

The fifth paragraph appoints a testamentary guardian, and the sixth names the executors who, under the seventh, are freed from the duty of giving a bond as such. The eighth paragraph confers a power of sale in general terms, and contains certain directions as to investments, without explicitly referring to real estate.

At the same time that testator executed his will, his wife, Margaret E. B. Strong, also executed her last will, in the presence of the same witnesses, in which the main provision is for the only child of her marriage with the aforesaid testator, a minor, Ann Emerson Strong, who was born June 15, 1928. In and by her last will testator’s wife, in brief, bequeathed some jewelry to their said daughter and some silverware to her husband. To the latter she also devised the so-called Allen creek property. To her brother she bequeathed $50,000, and then created a trust on $180,000, the income on which is to be paid half to her mother and half to an aunt for their respective lives, with remainder over to the estate of the testatrix. By the fifth paragraph she placed in trust all the rest of her estate, including any property or interest therein with respect to which she might have a power of appointment, or which she might be authorized to dispose of by will. This trust was for the benefit of the daughter for her fife with remainder over to the daughter’s issue, or heirs, with a power of testamentary appointment in the daughter upon her reaching the age of twenty-five years.

The sixth paragraph provides that if the husband of testatrix should die before she did, then she appointed as testamentary guardian of their daughter a named friend.

The will then named her husband to be executor, and conferred general powers on the trustee.

Neither will made any specific provision for the case of simultaneous death.

I. Those two testamentary plans are far from being reciprocal, although they manifest a mutual interest in the only child of these testators. Even in the typical setting, where the claim of reciprocity is usually set up, because each spouse leaves all to the other by wills executed at the same time and before the same witnesses, the rule has long been established that something more than even such great similarity is required; and that in addition thereto an agreement to make such counterpart wills must be clearly and satisfactorily proven, and that proof by presumption is insufficient. (Matter of Rosenblath, 146 Misc. 424.) In this case these wills are [449]*449in separate writings, neither of which makes any express reference to the other. Only in the husband’s will is mention made of any property he might receive “ as the heir ” of any person, which may refer to the intestacy of some person other than his wife. The mere fact that each will was drafted in the same law office, and signed there on the same day, and attested there by the same lawyers, implies that each testator knew of the other’s will, but this falls far short of making them reciprocal or mutual wills, or wills executed in pursuance of an agreement to make such wills as these are. The most that can be said of them is that they are simultaneous wills, but not similar, nor interdependent. There is no proof in this case that there was any agreement requiring this couple to make any such wills.

II. That these testators are the identical persons who, with their friend, and also with their airpilot, died together in the crash of this testator’s airplane in a thicket near Albany, N. Y., in a fog in the early hours of August 27, 1937, has been established to the satisfaction of this court, and is commonly accepted as the fact by all their relatives and friends.

The allegation of the petition to the effect that testator and his wife, and the two other persons named, all died at the same time in the common disaster above described has not been controverted, and has also been established to the satisfaction of this court.

For over sixty years the rule in this State has been that either survival, or simultaneous death, is a fact to be alleged and proved by the one claiming to benefit thereby.

“ There is no presumption of survivorship between * * * persons who perish in a common disaster, nor is there a presumption that * * * death occurred to all at the same instant and yet through necessity, in the administration of the law the title to real property passes and personal property is distributed as if they all perished at the same instant of time in the absence of proof of facts showing survivorship among them.” (St. John v. Andrews Institute for Girls, 117 App. Div. 698; modfd., 191 N. Y. 254.) Neither spouse is entitled in such case to participate in the estate of the other. (Matter of Burza, 151 Misc. 577.) So, when husband and wife die at once, his will leaving all to her does not become effective so as to pass by a residuary clause in her will (Matter of Lott, 65 Misc. 422); nor can the wife’s heirs take as a result of the husband’s will leaving his property to her. (Matter of Herrmann, 75 Misc. 599.) In the Lott case (supra) the husband had made his wife the sole beneficiary under his will; and she being his only legatee, the disposition of his individual estate was in accordance with the laws which govern in case of intestacy. In the Burza

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Bluebook (online)
171 Misc. 445, 12 N.Y.S.2d 544, 1939 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 1927, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/in-re-the-estate-of-strong-nysurct-1939.