Adams v. Adams

• Decision Date: 08 October 1956
• Docket Number: No. 1,No. 45476,45476,1
• Parties: Hedge Bland ADAMS, Garland Eugene Adams and Mary Elizabeth Adams, Respondents, v. William W. ADAMS, Rue Finley Mason and Minnie Jane Mason, appellants
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

Page 18

294 S.W.2d 18

Hedge Bland ADAMS, Garland Eugene Adams and Mary Elizabeth

Adams, Respondents, v. William W. ADAMS, Rue Finley Mason and Minnie Jane Mason, appellants.

No. 45476.

Supreme Court of Missouri, Division No. 1.

Oct. 8, 1956.

Francis G. Hale, Robert E. Coleberd, Liberty, for appellants.

J. William Blackford, Kansas City, for respondents.

HOLMAN, Commissioner.

Plaintiffs instituted this action seeking to establish an interest in certain farm lands; to have a contract declared to be a mortgage and an accounting as to the amount due thereon; for partition and for an accounting of a partnership with defendants which was alleged to have existed for 16 years without any occounting. A trial resulted in the entry of an interlocutory decree and a modified interlocutory decree which, in effect, decreed that plaintiffs were the equitable owners of a certain described tract of 187.375 acres of land, subject to the amount due on the contract which was held to be a mortgage, ordered an accounting, and appointed a referee to which the matter of the accounting was referred. A motion for new trial was overruled and the defendants Mason have appealed.

The plaintiffs are Hedge Bland Adams, his son Garland, and the latter's wife Mary Elizabeth Adams. The defendants are William W. Adams (brother of Hedge), his daughter Minnie Jane Mason, and her husband Rue Finley Mason. The various controversies herein grow out of the ownership and operation of the Adams family farm containing about 375 acres. The farm was acquired by Hedge and William under the will of their father who died in 1916. In 1932 these brothers gave a deed of trust thereon to secure a note for $16,000 to The Commercial Bank of Liberty, which was paid as a result of the partition proceedings hereafter mentioned. In 1933 the land was sold in partition and purchased in the name of William who placed deeds of trust thereon to the Federal Land Bank and Land Bank Commissioner securing notes in the total sum of $19,000. We infer from the oral arguments in this court that the reason for the partition sale and resulting transfer of title to William was the fact the Hedge's wife had become of unsound mind and hence not legally capable of transacting business. At any rate, plaintiffs continued to live on the farm.

On July 29, 1938, William and his wife conveyed the land to Rue and Minnie Mason subject to the encumbrances heretofore noted. On the same day two other instruments were executed. In one, Rue and Minnie Mason, as first parties, agreed (in substance) with Hedge, Garland and Mary Elizabeth Adams, second parties (plaintiffs), that they would convey to Garland and Mary a tract, therein described, containing 187.375 acres (a part of the aforementioned farm) at any time during the lifetime of either Garland or Hedge upon the condition that second parties pay first parties (1) $1,710.28, with interest, which they had expended for the benefit of Hedge, (2) any further monies, with interest, thereafter advanced for the benefit of second parties, and (3) one half of the amounts thereafter paid by first parties on the encumbrances heretofore described. It was further provided that second parties give first parties a note for $1,000 secured as a vendor's lien. In the event Garland and wife acquired the title to said land under that agreement, it was further provided that they could purchase an additional tract of 27 1/2 acres for $58.80 per acre.

The other instrument executed on July 29, 1983, was a partnership agreement, for the operation of the whole farm, entered into by Rue Mason, William W. Adams, Hedge Adams, and Garland Adams. The terms of this agreement need not be stated, but it may be noted that it provided that there should be an annual accounting among the partners and that checks on the partnership bank account should be signed by William W. Adams. On May 6, 1942, the encumbrances heretofore mentioned were paid and released of record.

The relief sought by plaintiffs has already been stated generally. In part, it was alleged that William Adams kept the books of the partnership (which was terminated by Mason in 1954); that there has never been an accounting, and that defendants have refused to give plaintiffs an accounting. The answers filed by defendants substantially denied the allegations of the petition.

On January 17, 1956, an interlocutory decree was filed which found and provided (1) that plaintiffs were the owners of the fee-simple title to the tract of 187.375 acres described in the aforementioned contract, (2) that said contract was in fact a mortgage on said land representing an indebtedness which plaintiffs owe the Masons, the amount thereof to be determined by a referee, (3) that after payment of said mortgage debt, Garland and wife could enforce the agreement by the Masons to sell them the additional 27 1/2 acres of land, (4) that no partnership accounting had been given plaintiffs, and (5) that the matter be referred to Richard A. Moore, an attorney, for an accounting of the partnership and also of the amount due on the mortgage (contract) and that he report his findings to the court.

The defendants Mason filed a motion to modify or set aside said interlocutory decree and also a separate motion for new trial. On March 1, 1956, the court entered a 'Modified Interlocutory Decree.' It is not entirely clear from the record whether this latter decree was supplemental to or substituted for the first decree. We have concluded (as was apparently the construction of the parties) that it was supplemental to the first one. However, since we are of the view (as hereafter indicated) that the appeal herein is premature, and hence the cause is still pending in the trial court, it would seem that the trial court would be authorized to make such amendments as it deems advisable to clarify that question and...