Spicer v. Spicer's Adm'r

• Decision Date: 17 March 1925
• Docket Number: No. 36534.,36534.
• Citation: 202 N.W. 604,201 Iowa 99
• Parties: SPICER v. SPICER'S ADM'R ET AL.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

201 Iowa 99

202 N.W. 604

SPICER

v.SPICER'S ADM'R ET AL.

No. 36534.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

March 17, 1925.

Appeal from District Court, Hamilton County; G. D. Thompson, Judge.

This is a controversy over a claim in probate against the estate of William Spicer for services rendered to the decedent during his lifetime. The defense was a general denial, and a plea that the alleged services were rendered gratuitously by the plaintiff as a member of the family. Trial was had to a jury, and a verdict was rendered for the plaintiff for the full amount claimed. Judgment was entered upon the verdict, and the defendants have appealed. Affirmed.Martin & Alexander, of Webster City, for appellants.

R. G. Remley, Henderson & Jones, and Burnstedt & Hemingway, all of Webster City, for appellee.

EVANS, J.

William Spicer died in 1921 at the age of 92 years. His wife had died in the year 1919 at the age of 86 years. The plaintiff had been reared from infancy by the decedent. She was the daughter of decedent's brother, and came into the family of the decedent a motherless babe of 10 days. The decedent had no children. The plaintiff was reared in his family as an own child, and such relation was never broken until the death of the decedent. The plaintiff attained her majority in the year 1902. She was never formally adopted by decedent, but was always treated as a daughter by the decedent and his wife. The relations between her and them were at all times mutually affectionate, and were substantially equivalent to those between daughter and parents. When the plaintiff arrived at her majority, the decedent was 73 years of age. Her claim covers the period from that date to the date of death of the decedent. The nature of the service rendered was such as was incident to the care of the household and to the aged couple as the increasing burden of the years grew upon them.

The court laid upon the plaintiff the burden of showing that the services rendered were so rendered in the mutual expectation that they should be compensated. One of the principal contentions on this appeal is that the evidence was insufficient to show such mutual expectation. Another contention is that the evidence is insufficient to show that the services rendered were even approximately of the value found by the verdict of the jury. This verdict was for $15,045.

[1] On these two questions thus raised it has become necessary for us to read the entire evidence. We have heretofore held that the mutual expectations of making and receiving compensation, as between the decedent and claimant, may be established by circumstance as well as by direct evidence. That is to say, the nature and circumstance of the service may be such as to rebut the presumption of a gratuity. Soderland v. Graeber, 190 Iowa, 765, 180 N. W. 745;Feltes v. Tobin, 187 Iowa, 11, 171 N. W. 739;In re Estate of Oldfield, 175 Iowa, 118, 156 N. W. 977, L. R. A. 1916D, 1260, Ann. Cas. 1917D, 1067;Snyder v. Nixon, 188 Iowa, 779, 176 N. W. 808.

[2] On this question the record herein is not lacking in direct evidence, although it be somewhat meager. Such direct evidence has much corroboration in the circumstances. We are required to take the evidence in the light most favorable to the plaintiff as appellee. The record discloses that she was a very capable person. Before her attaining her majority, she had graduated from the high school at Webster City. She had at that time ambitions which she might have attained if she could have dissolved the ties which bound her to her quasi parents. One of the circumstances urged against her by the appellant is that she immediately found employment in Webster City, and that she continued the same during most of the time covered by her claim herein. It is true that during much of such time she has acted as bookkeeper successively for certain firms in her home town. This employment, however, was always subject to her duties in the household, and was not permitted to interfere therewith. In the earlier years following her majority, her household duties were not as arduous, naturally, as they became later with the advancing years of her parents. The wife of the decedent was frail and sickly for many years prior to her death. She met with an accident at one time, resulting in serious injury to her arm, which greatly disabled her for years thereafter. Much of the time she was unable to dress herself or to comb her own hair. This does not mean that she was wholly helpless in doing more or less other work. She did aid in many of the household duties when her strength would permit. But the real dependency of the household was upon the plaintiff. No domestic help was employed. She rose early in the morning and worked late at night. She was the caretaker of furnace and stove, and built all the fires. In the last years of the life of the wife she required much care from the plaintiff. It is also true that during the last ten years of his life the decedent suffered much disability from sickness, both chronic and acute. He was at all times very deaf, and it was difficult to communicate with him. He suffered from an affliction of the feet, which greatly impeded his ability to get about even when he was otherwise comparatively well. He was frequently confined to his bed with acute illness for two or three weeks at a time. There were times when trained nurses were employed because of the seriousness of the illness. Notwithstanding such employment, the duties imposed upon the plaintiff became more onerous rather than less. The nurse had to have help, and she was the helper at all hours of the day or night. At such times she suspended her employment downtown. In the last two years of the life of the decedent it became necessary to have assistance in his care. A man and his wife were employed, who moved into the home and rendered such help. Much night work was necessary in the care of the decedent during such period, and plaintiff was the helper of the man nurse at such time. During the entire period covered by this claim the plaintiff paid her own personal expenses out of her own earnings. She also contributed much from such earnings to the necessities and conveniences of the household. The long habit of thrift and economy had brought the decedent to the verge of penuriousness, and he was reluctant to incur any expenditure that went beyond the barest necessity. Cleaning, papering, and painting were not necessities within his conception. His thrift was very pardonable, in that his estate was only a modest one of about $20,000.

It appears that he frequently expressed his great appreciation of the care and service rendered by the claimant, and that he expressed his intention that she should be compensated. Much of this evidence indicates that his expectation was that she was to be compensated out of his estate. He said that she “would have” his property. Whether he intended to make a will to that effect, or whether he labored under the belief that she would inherit as his child, or whether he rested in the knowledge that the law would award to her a quantum meruit against his estate for her services, is an open question upon the record. Upon all the circumstances appearing, it is quite inexplicable that he should not intend that she should have adequate compensation out of his estate. He had no lineal descendants. He was one of a family of ten brothers and two sisters. One brother survived him. A majority of the other members of his family left lineal descendants, who were resident in several states. The majority of them were wholly unknown...