Olson v. Dixon
| Decision Date | 20 November 1925 |
| Docket Number | No. 24851.,24851. |
| Citation | 165 Minn. 124,205 N.W. 955 |
| Court | Minnesota Supreme Court |
| Parties | OLSON et al. v. DIXON et al. |
Appeal from District Court, Olmsted County; Charles E. Callaghan, Judge.
Suit by Addie V. Olson and another against Charles Dixon, as representative of the estate of James L. White, deceased, and others, for specific performance. Plaintiffs appeal from an order denying a new trial. Affirmed.
A. J. Rockne, of Zumbrota, and D. C. Sheldon, of Pine Island, for appellants.
Henry O. Christensen, of Rochester, and Morphy, Bradford & Cummins, of St. Paul, for respondents.
This is a suit to enforce specific performance of a parol contract between the plaintiffs and James L. White, now deceased.
In effect the contract was one which provided that White should dispose of all his property by will, designating plaintiffs as sole beneficiaries under the will in consideration of personal services they were to render to him during his lifetime.
At the trial, after counsel for plaintiffs had made his opening statement, objection was made to the introduction of any evidence on the ground that the complaint fails to state facts constituting a cause of action. The objection was sustained, and an application for leave to amend the complaint in certain particulars was denied. A motion for a new trial followed. Plaintiffs appealed from a denial thereof.
A statement of the material facts follows: In the year 1914 White was a widower about 70 years of age, and lived alone on a farm in Olmsted county. Plaintiffs were trained nurses, and had employment at Milwaukee, Wis. Their parents and White were neighbors. White repeatedly requested plaintiffs to give up their work at Milwaukee and make their home with their parents in order that they might care for him in his old age and render to him such domestic services as he needed. To induce them to comply with his request he promised to convey to them about one acre of his land upon which they might erect a dwelling house where they could live and also promised that, if they prepared his meals, did his washing and mending, and nursed him when he was ill, he would devise the remainder of his real estate to them and bequeath to them such personal property as he might own at the time of his death. Plaintiffs accepted White's offer, gave up their positions in Milwaukee, returned to the home of their parents, erected a substantial dwelling house on the acre White conveyed to them, moved into the house, responded to all of White's requests for assistance, furnished his meals, did his mending and washing, nursed him in times of illness, and in all things performed their part of the contract to White's entire satisfaction.
In the year 1921 White was declared to be mentally incompetent, and committed, by the probate court of Olmsted county, to the hospital for the insane at Rochester, where he remained until he died in 1922. He failed to execute a will or transfer any of his property to plaintiffs except the acre heretofore mentioned. No widow, children, or issue of deceased children survived; his heirs at law being his sister and the children of deceased brothers and sisters.
The first named defendant was appointed administrator of White's estate and petitioned the probate court for a...
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