Cook v. Gore's Estate

• Decision Date: 18 March 1909
• Citation: 82 Vt. 137,72 A. 322
• Parties: COOK v. GORE'S ESTATE.
• Court: Vermont Supreme Court

72 A. 322

82 Vt. 137

COOK

v. GORE'S ESTATE.

Supreme Court of Vermont. Windham.

March 18, 1909.

Exceptions from Windham County Court; George M. Powers, Judge.

Action by Mary A. Cook against Lorenzo Gore's estate to compel the allowance of a claim against the estate. Judgment and verdict for claimant, and the estate excepts. Judgment affirmed.

Argued before ROWELL, C. J., and MUNSON, WATSON, and HASELTON, JJ.

Chase & Daley, for claimant. Arthur P. Carpenter and Addison E. Cudworth, for defendant.

WATSON, J. The evidence introduced by the plaintiff, showing that on October 22, 1894, she let her father, Lorenzo Gore, then in life, have the sum of $1,035, does not appear from the record to have been disputed. Sylvia A. Gore, the widow of Lorenzo, testified that the agreement between him and Mary (the plaintiff) in regard to this money was: "The money was put into the place for her and her children, and she was to have her pay and interest on it," and that "she should have her money when she called for it, her children should have their home and be boarded there, and she should pay him for their board." The witness further testified that the plaintiff's young son was afterwards boarded by Lorenzo four years and a few months at $1 per week as a payment on this loan, that he boarded other of Mary's children as a payment thereon, and that Mary was boarded there two summers in the same way at the price of $1.50 per week. Lorenzo died January 24 1906. The record does not show that these facts, testified to by Mrs. Gore, were in any way controverted, nor that any claim was made on the part of the estate that they are not true. The statute of limitations is pleaded, and it was contended that, if the loan was made at the time above stated, it was barred. The court instructed the jury in effect that the statute would not begin to run until demand was made, and that as the case was presented a recovery was not barred, to which an exception was taken.

Was this error? Is the only question before us. It is contended that no demand was necessary to set the statute in motion, and that the claim was barred by the lapse of six years after the loan was made. We think the undisputed contract, fairly construed, shows that a home and board for the plaintiff and her children at her father's house were contemplated by the parties, and to this end she let him have the money to put into his place, she and her children to have a home and be boarded there, as she might...